Stripped
by Loid
Summary: The line between unbridled hatred and unconscious lust takes front seat in this story about an unconventional relationship between Shinigami and Hollow. GrimmIchi. Rated MA for violence, strong sexual content involving males and language.
1. Chapter 1

_Stripped_

The author is not making money on the production of this story. It is a work of fan-oriented nature. All characters belong to Kubo Tite.

Rating : MA (For adult language, adult situations, strong sexual content, and violence)

* * *

AN : This story is written during, up to, and past current storyline (mostly the time in between the actual storyline). There are spoilers for the Arrancar and Hueco Mundo arcs. So don't read this if you aren't caught up on the anime (not the shitty fillers, I refuse to watch them) and / or the manga up to and possibly past chapter -100.

Also, this story is written from Grimmjow's POV. Previous examples of my work like this can be seen in _Burritos and Tequila._

* * *

I never wanted to fight in any kind of war, it's not my style. I was perfectly content wandering the vast plains of Hueco Mundo, devouring everything that came into my domain, alone for eternity.

It would seem that my life is not something I have control over.

He came to us with out stretched hands and promises of glory, strength and our names engraved in the ever lasting history of our spiritual worlds. To all of us, it sounded beyond glorious. Even to the vasto lorde, who had spent their days lounging about, doing nothing of real consequence, his proposition seemed perfect. Aizen transformed our bodies and ripped away our masks, gave us zanpakutou and a sudden new meaning for our existence.

Or so we thought.

With every arrancar he peels the mask away from, we loose that sense of self that we have carried for centuries. Every time we feel that fluctuation in his reitsu, we slip away from each other. Our once tight knit sense of unity is being ripped apart by greed and destruction. We never used to argue amongst each other, each vasto lorde reined his own area and we kept to ourselves. If Earth has rulers and Soul Society has captains, Hueco Mundo has the vasto lorde.

It will never go back to the way it was.

He dangled false pretense in front of our eyes like it was a pure soul, begging us to jump. We fell for it, even if we are highly intelligent beasts, we are still simply beasts who function on desire and instinct. I remember the day he turned us. Rounded us up like cattle and yanked off the masks we had been hiding behind for years.

I was no longer hollow. I was something new, more powerful, foreign. Stark naked and completely confused, I was branded with a six and thrown into a world where my lack of compassion was my greatest gift and my largest weakness. I remember watching as he turned one of the oldest of our kind, stripping away his helmet and bringing his pale features to light. I shuddered then as I watched the tears splash down onto the floor between his shaking hands. To this day, I don't know if they were tears of pain or tears of despair as his identity was both exposed and torn away simultaneously.

He was never the same after that. His usual demeanor is now replaced with an empty shell of an arrancar.

The process only drove me to be angrier, more distant and colder. I killed anything I could get my hands on, including other arrancar. I sacrificed my few loyal companions simply because I needed to prove that I was capable of destruction and sorrow.

The day my only companions died was the day I met the one person that could bend me in ways I'd never known possible.

The damned kid bloodied me up pretty badly the first time we fought. I couldn't stop staring at him as he stood and took every blow I threw at him with a certain air of depressing grace. He became a god in my eyes when I dropped him to the ground in an explosion of anger and concrete. Just as that dirt cleared, I watched with stupidity as he launched a wave of black desperation at me, leaving two very different scars on my body. I couldn't stop laughing as he retaliated again and again.

I wanted him. Needed to feel the power that I could never obtain. I don't take to loosing with style, finesse or grace. I'll admit I'm a horrible loser, but my hard outer shell would like to say otherwise. But he had something about him that told me I could never destroy him, not matter how hard I tried.

And try I did. I fought with everything I had, in every manner I could imagine.

And still, he stood back up every single time and stared at me with those chocolate eyes that screamed he would never back down.

I left that night on the tail of one of Aizen's cronies, wishing that I could have dove into Kurosaki Ichigo's soul for just a moment. To lay within him. Dwell inside his thoughts. Discover what it was that pushed him to be such a perfect specimen of everything I couldn't be. With each meeting that passed, I learned more and more that if I were black, he was white. If I were cold, he was fire. And if I were hate, he was love.

Although love is something funny, at least in my case.

* * *

I paced my room, furious beyond reason that my arm had been blown off and my newly acquired rank stolen from me by an arrancar whose gender I wasn't quite sure of. He had stood there, with his masculine voice and feminine body, laughing at me while I drug my bleeding and torn carcass away from that place. That is how I ended up in my room, leaving a trail of scarlet running behind me as I walked around in an attempt to calm myself.

Nothing was helping. I ended up eating the first arrancar that walked passed my room. Some woman with orange hair and green eyes. As I stood over her, watching those green orbs roll into the back of her head, I imagined what it would be like to choke the life out of the orange haired shinigami. What he would taste like is still a mystery to me, but I like to muse myself into thinking he tastes like strawberries.

And as I tossed her limp form back into the hallway and stared for a moment at her head cracked against the white washed walls and blood splattered like paint, this hunger I could never fathom began building in the bottom of my stomach. Glancing around, I vanished through a black hole in space, unbeknownst to the rest of Hueco Mundo. They would never miss me, I was hardly an Espada anymore.

It was dusk in the human world. I sat on a nearby rooftop and watched as the sun sank lower and lower and the shadows became deeper, longer. I could feel the boy running toward me, but I just stayed still. I let him come to me. For a very long time, that is how we played. I would come to the human world, and he would appear before me. Even though I could find him in a heartbeat, I wouldn't. I could open a rip in space directly on top of him if I chose, but I don't.

Desperation is an ugly color on anyone.

It is this night, with the back drop of the sinking sun and the sky streaked blood red, that our story really begins.

* * *

AN : OBVIOUS LEAPS HAVE BEEN TAKEN WITH MY STORY. I don't want to read ANY reviews whining about how I'm not being super technical about the history of the Hollow race. None of us know what their history is, or how their chains of command work, or even what their previous realities were like. I am making INTELLIGENT assumptions based on what I know.

Review with smart criticism, or just plain kudos. I love kudos. Plot coming soon!


	2. Chapter 2

AN : The more I think about the Arrancar arc, the less it makes sense. There were no espada or completed arrancar until Aizen brought the Hougyuka, correct? So why are there flashbacks of the espada that seem to be years and years ago ie: Nel and Nnotria. Also, what is up with the Primaveron Espada, their existence would have to mean that Aizen created them and then unseated them weeks later, just to put the current 10 espada to their seats.

I know Kubo Tite is a god at lucking into fixing his plot holes (lol Kenpachi uses two hands?) but these are going to be super hard to fix. He'll probably just ignore them so they go away.

ITT : I'm messing your shit up.

* * *

I sat under the dark night with it's stars glittering like dew drops and it's moon a giant smile yawned across the scenery, waiting patiently for him to come to me. And come to me he did. With his feathers puffed up and his zanpakutou drawn in the most menacing way he could muster. Comical, really. He always looks so serious.

"Didn't get enough the first time?" he laughed at my back as I sat completely motionless and stared at the heavens I would never touch.

"I'll never get enough," I said quietly, not certain what I meant. I stood then, retching myself from my rather comfortable position. As I turned to look at the man I knew would eventually end my life, I smiled. It wasn't a sadistic smile, nor was it a happy smile. It was a smile that sat somewhere between the death of a second cousin and the marriage of a previous love.

"What happened to your arm?" Ichigo asked, slowly letting the tip of his zanpakutou fall until it sat on the still sun-warmed grit of the shingles.

"Same thing that always happens," I laughed.

"Don't fuck with me," he spat.

"I would never do something like that," I muttered sarcastically.

He simply stared at me while I shifted my body and began walking toward his prone frame. Something changed in his demeanor as I came closer, it was almost as though with each step, he became more and more nervous. Like I was some deadly disease he could catch just by being in the same general area.

I found out later it was that he was extremely confused as to why I was coming after him when I left Pantera lying on the roof like an abandoned toy.

I stopped several feet in front of his chest, wanting to move forward, but something tugged me back into reality and slapped me across the face each time I tried. I raised my hand to touch the face of that angel, but he beat me back with a resounding smack.

"Don't touch me, filth," he said with a disgusted and commanding tone. I should have known that someone fallen so far from the grace of divinity would never be able to touch the pure so effortlessly. For quite a substantial amount of time, I never wanted anything sexual from him. I only wanted to touch him and revel in him with a sense of awe, the same way people yearn to touch wet paint or run their hands over a marble sculpture. Because he was a true work of God, a being perfect in both form and function.

I retrieved my hand and wrapped it across my chest and over my shoulder, shuddering slightly at the lack of meat beyond my stump.

"I almost wish you'd have taken it from me," I spoke slowly, turning slightly to give the boy a cold shoulder.

"What are you talking about?" he asked.

"My arm. I was unseated the second you scarred up my tattoo, this is just the grinding blow," I said with anger, speaking to the stars. Slowly, I sunk back down to my seated position and stared at the dark sky, admiring the moon peeking out from behind the gray clouds. A small smile crept across my face as I felt him sit down beside me.

"Who cut it off?" he said quietly.

"Tousen."

"Why?"

"Apparently, I'm bad at doing what I'm told and needed to be taught a lesson."

"So he cut off your arm?"

"And incinerated it. Right in front of me. Nearly bled to death on my way back to the room."

I felt him move, "Then why are you here?"

His question took me off guard. I originally came because I was angry, hungry and wanted to take it out on something. But as I thought about it more and more, I didn't really know why I went to the human world. To feed, perhaps, or maybe even to beat the shit out of the kid. But the second I saw him, I faltered and couldn't do anything but feel his presence wash through me like a drug.

"I just needed out of that place," I finally managed to come up with. Horrible excuse, but he bought it. I pushed my lone hand behind my head and laid back, watching as the stars began to pop into the dark sky.

"What is it like?" he asked timidly.

"What is what like?" I responded.

"Hueco Mundo, is that what it is called?"

"Yeah. Hollow World. I can't say the name doesn't fit it."

"Is it really that awful?" he said as he shifted his body and glanced down at me.

I stared back into those warm eyes and sighed, "It's not bad but it's not good. It's mostly just very boring. I mean, you have to understand that even before I was turned, I was with the elite of the elite."

"I could never imagine the life of the strong being boring." He is so naïve.

"Most boring thing I've ever done. Even feeding becomes a chore because we have to actually look to find something worth our time," I said to the sky. "The reason you people didn't have accurate readings on the vasto lorde is simply because we never left Hueco Mundo. There was no reason, nothing in the human world is worth our time."

"I would have just gone to Soul Society," he said with a small grin.

"Which is why you could never live as a Hollow, boy." His innocence was something pure and beautiful, his complete ignorance to the entire situation between worlds was both annoying and relieving. Of course he would never understand why we wouldn't just pop into Soul Society and eat everything we could find. First of all, the vasto lorde, while having a complete respect for one another, hated each other with a loathing that ran so deep we would never manage to group ourselves together long enough to make a coup of the other world. Second, how could we ever take on the strength of that world? Of course, as Espada, we really are stronger than they are, but as simple gillian we were harmless flies to an army of captain class shinigami.

He stayed quiet, with his knees bent to his chest and his chin on his folded arms. I finally broke the silence, hoping he would muse me.

"Tell me a secret," I said, turning my eyes from the sky to his body.

"What kind of secret?"

"Anything you've never told anyone before."

He seemed to think about it for ages before he came up with the most unlikely response I've ever heard. "My dad came home one night and found that someone had put dish soap in the VCR player, and to this day I've blamed my little sister Karin. But it was me. I put the dish soap in the VCR."

I couldn't help but laugh. I watched him then, as he laughed until tears spotted his eyes and he began shifting his weight. Suddenly, before I could even fathom what he was doing, he had the back of his head resting on the still bruised expanse of my torso. I winced as he moved to get comfortable, with his orange locks gracing my stomach and his legs bent skyward. He moved one of his hands upward and rested it on my ribcage gently, making me wonder what exactly he was up to.

"I didn't really mean a secret like that," I laughed at him slightly. I wanted nothing more than to wrap my missing arm around his body, but the still painful throb of the bandaged stump of useless flesh was the annoying proof I will never be able to have what I want.

"That was my secret, if you want another, you have to tell me one," he said quietly, laying completely frozen, almost scared to move.

A smirk crossed my features as the words left his gorgeous lips. I couldn't help myself as I simply blurted out the first thing that came to my mind. "I want to spend the rest of the night staring at stars I'll never touch, playing with the hair of a man I can never have."

He fidgeted slightly, moving to keep his shoulder blades from grinding into the hard rooftop. "Okay," he muttered, soft enough that even I almost missed it. We lay their for hours, idly chatting about nothing of real consequence. And as I lightly brushed the tips of his wildly colored hair and began to drift to sleep under that pale moon, I felt a kind of content that I hadn't felt since I was alive. Hard to describe, I had left my troubles of Aizen and Luppi in a place that wasn't on that roof. I drifted to sleep and had another dreamless night, constantly startling myself awake to look down at the boy curled up on my chest.

I knew I shouldn't have let myself fall to sleep. Because once I woke up, Ichigo was no longer there.

* * *

AN : As I'm sure some of my previous readers can see, this story is sort of several different experiments for me. I want his interaction with Ichigo to be completely different from that which we see from the original writing, because these are clips into their life we don't get to see. I'm trying to establish their hatred for each other when it's needed, but their adoration for each other when they don't have to hate.

Make sense? Probably not. I know what I'm doing, and that is all that matters to me.

Review and give me lots of e-love.


	3. Chapter 3

AN : I own two very retarded fish. One keeps running into the glass and the other keeps getting it's head stuck under the rocks. In other news, this chapter is hard to write because I'm listening to Fight of the Conchords and I keep laughing so hard I can't focus on how serious this chapter is going to be.

* * *

Aizen had one of his cronies locate my whereabouts the next day and I was drug into his domain. Figuratively drug, of course, I probably would have torn that fucking fraccion's head off if it actually touched me.

"Grimmjow," he said with a smile as I walked through the double doors. I will never be able to figure out why he sits in that massive chair on that massive slab of limestone in that massive room. I bet he's compensating for something.

"Have a seat," Aizen spoke with that bored drawl, motioning toward one of the white chairs to the side.

"I'll stand," I half spat. I still, to this day, refuse to acknowledge his superiority.

"Suit yourself," he laughed, sipping on that damned watered down tea. "Now, you probably know why I have you here."

"You decided that asswipe Luppi doesn't suck cock as great as you thought he would and now you want me back."

God, that was a stupid thing to say. I choked under the sudden flare of his omnipotent reitsu and almost collapsed. Saving face, I stared at him as he smiled sarcastically, slowly pulling his reitsu back to normal levels.

"Actually, it has nothing to do with the six, it has to do with you and where exactly you were last night."

Shit. I was found out. "I was in the human world," I said defensively.

"Doing what, exactly?" he smiled.

"Looking for something to eat."

"Is that the story you are sticking with?" He sounded like a father figure out of a really bad sitcom. And, of course, I would have been the rebellious teenage daughter. I say daughter because father's never care where their sons are. I promise I'm not a girl.

"If you already know what I was doing, why are you asking?" I should learn to keep my mouth shut.

"I wanted to hear it out of your mouth," he said as he stood from that over-sized chair. "Now, I know that you are not my biggest fan," he started speaking as I felt the sickening pressure crushing down in the room, "but I cannot have you running around, doing what you please with the shinigami."

"I was hardly doing it because I wanted to do it," I spat, falling to a knee as the bile built in the back of my throat.

"Then why, Grimmjow. Why would you defy me so joyously, are you trying to anger me?" I thought my bones were going to snap into shards as he walked closer and closer to me.

"If I wanted to piss you the fuck off, I wouldn't have done anything short of raping one of those assholes that follow you around all the time." My hands came into contact with the cold floor as I spoke the words, the pain becoming more excruciating than anything I'd felt in a very long time.

"I am wondering why I am keeping you around," Aizen spoke slowly, "Tousen feels as though you should be destroyed with as much trouble as you give me." I almost puked as his hand grabbed my chin and yanked my face to stare into those dead eyes. "But I think you will be of some use to us. Don't prove me wrong, Grimmjow."

I just stared at him, holding my tongue against every insult I wanted to throw at him.

"Do we have an agreement?" he asked quietly. When I refused to respond, mostly because I felt as though I was being smothered, he smiled and took his filthy hands off of my face. "I'm glad you understand, Grimmjow."

The weight of his reitsu vanished in almost a second and as I puked stomach acid onto the white washed floor he walked away smiling.

I don't know why I followed him as long as I did.

* * *

"You look like shit."

I laughed slightly, "Thanks for that."

His chocolate eyes glared at me suddenly. "Don't be an asshole, you really do look like shit."

"It hasn't been my day."

I had returned to the human world that night and we met in an empty shopping plaza. It was very strange seeing him as nothing more than a human, he hadn't even bothered jumping bodies. He looked so strangely beautiful wearing something other than the shinigami robes. Of course, I could see more of his intoxicating form, so I was happy.

"What happened?" he asked, as if he really cared.

"Seems Aizen doesn't quite approve of my being here."

He laughed slightly, "Well, I don't think I would like one of my strongest militant officers suddenly dropping off the radar to have a chat with the enemy."

"Oh, so your captain doesn't care?" He was just pissing me off with his mightier-than-thou attitude.

"I don't even have a captain. I'm a human, I won't be an actual shinigami until I kick the bucket." I hadn't known this at the time. I honestly thought he was a seated officer in the Gotei 13. They never tell the Espada about anything. Well, except Ulquiorra, he knows everything. I think he sucks some major cock to get that information.

"I feel like killing you just so that I won't be the only one in deep shit around here," I laughed, half serious.

Of course, then it was his turn to get serious on me. "Why the hell are you here if you are in such deep shit?"

"Because I fucking hate that cunt muscle." He just blinked at me. Obviously my fun derogatory terms were above his level of humor.

"But, he could probably just kill you, or something like that."

"Apparently I should be of some use to him, I'm not sure what he means though."

"That makes you sound like a sex slave or something," he laughed.

"I would never be his rape toy," I shuddered. "I wouldn't mind being yours though." I must have been in a good mood that night. Of course, he just stared at me stupidly again. "I'm just fucking with you," I muttered quickly, trying to save the situation.

"Oh, okay. I thought you were being serious," he laughed.

Of course, I was being half serious. I'd never be his toy. He could always be mine though.

"I apologize that my humor is on a little different level than yours is."

"I'm over it." He's always over it.

We both felt it at the same time. A reitsu coming toward us at a rapid pace. I glanced at him and he let out a deep sigh. "Sorry dude, looks like we've got to either start some shit or high tail it out of here."

"Actually, I had fun fighting with you," I laughed at him.

"Yo, me too. Wanna do this?"

"Promise not to kill me?"

"Fuck, I can't promise that." I didn't really hold that against him.

Just as Ichigo slipped out of his body and our steel rang against each other, a man resembling a pineapple jumped off a roof and landed a little too close to me for comfort. I felt like snapping his neck like a twig at that moment, and I could have done it so easily. I could have wrapped my fingers around that thick throat and choked the tattoos straight off his skin.

Ichigo's eyes told me to slow the fuck up because doing that would probably piss someone off.

"Do you need some help?" the man asked. Even his voice was annoying.

"No," Ichigo smiled.

"Isn't this that fucker that showed up a few days ago and almost killed Rukia?" I didn't even know who this Rukia was, but obviously she was yet another woman I had wronged.

The orange haired boy sighed, "Yes, which is why I'm busy trying to kill him but you are kind of getting in my way."

"We could finish the job in ten seconds if you let me help."

"I'm alright by myself, Renji. I'm fairly certain you would probably get hurt." At least the kid was honest.

"Pfft, what is the worst he could do? He's only got one ar-" I lost my temper. Still holding Pantera, I jolted forward and wrapped my fingers around that stupid neck and squeezed, slicing a deep laceration into his chest with it's blade as I ground the hilt into the soft flesh under his chin.

"I have what? What the fuck do I have?" I started yelling at him as he gasped and sputtered for breath. "Let me guess. You are Captain Obvious and figured out that I only have one arm. Am I right? Well, I only have one arm because of that fucker right there." I would have used my other hand to point at Ichigo, but I couldn't.

"Stop it Grimmjow," Ichigo muttered as he walked over to break it up. The red head under my hand was making some pretty awesome gurgling noises as I pressed the hard metal into his soft flesh further.

"The only reason I didn't end you the second you showed your hideous face is because that kid right there can obviously think of one good reason to keep you around, although I can't imagine it's really that great of a reason."

"Seriously, Grimmjow, I think he gets it."

"Shut the fuck up or I'll fucking kill both of you." He just rolled his eyes at me. Only three days of knowing me and he already could see past the temper tantrum. It was at that second everything dawned on me and I let the man's throat fall from my fingers. He saw through my hollow threat, he knew I would never touch a hair on his beautifully captivating head.

"We are leaving right now," I said to Ichigo as the man coughed up blood onto the pavement and stared at the boy with a confused look.

"I don't think that's a great idea," Ichigo said to me quietly.

"Why the fuck not, I need to leave."

"Then leave, I'm not coming with you."

I was about to loose my temper again. "Get your head out of your ass and come on," I grabbed his wrist and gave a sharp tug which resulted in a nice punch across the jaw.

"I'm not coming with you, and I am not repeating myself."

I lost it. I couldn't see straight, I was so pissed. I just about tore that beautiful head right off that beautiful body as he leaned down and helped the red head to his feet. It wasn't a jealous rage, it was obvious the two of them hated each other just as much as I should have hated Ichigo, but they had one thing in common that I would never have with him. They were brothers-in-arms with a common enemy. Me.

I didn't see the boy again until he had a mask pulled over his face.

* * *

AN : I, personally, hate Renji. I killed him in the first version of this chapter, but realized that would compromise my true goal of this story.

I'm having a hard time making these chapters as long as I usually have them. So answer me this. Are the chapters, in your opinion, too short, too long, or just right? Even if you don't have an opinion on the matter, leave me a review so I feel good about myself and write more. Or something like that.


	4. Chapter 4

AN : I had the worst best weekend of my life. My marine ex-boyfriend came home Friday and I'm pretty sure I was only at home for about two hours total on Saturday. xD

* * *

I had stared down at those shinigami with anger and annoyance when I realized he wasn't in the group. Truth be told, I could hardly even detect where he was, but I felt this strange pang of familiarity to the south and disbanded from the group, much to Yami's protests.

It was the most surreal experience I've ever had, I was running until a sudden explosion of his reitsu nailed me like a ton of bricks and I watched as he melted out of thin air and stared at me.

"You're finally back," was the only thing he said.

I felt like grabbing him and crushing our bodies together and stripping him down to take him then and there, but he would never let me. Although I knew I could take him down, even with only one arm, I couldn't do that to him. I never wanted to ruin the captivating reality of him.

"Of course I am back," I said smugly. "Did you honestly think I would leave you high and dry like that?"

He just stared at me with angry eyes. "We can't play this game again. People are too close, I can't risk having this conversation with you."

I didn't stop myself as I walked toward his form. I grabbed his chin and jerked his face upward so I could look into those eyes. I let my lips hover so close to his that I tasted the innocence dripping off of him and whispered, "What conversation?" I spoke slow and calculating, letting the skin of my lips brush his so slightly I could hardly feel it. "The conversation where you condemn me for being a monster, or the one where we finally stop acting like children and start acting like the monsters we both know we are?"

I will give the boy props, he never let his eyes fall from mine, even as I let my hand fall from his face and pulled my lips a safe distance away from his. We stood in a strained silence, fighting the urge we both knew we wouldn't be able to resist for much longer.

"I haven't seen you in a month, Grimmjow," he said with sad eyes.

"Well it looks like you have been busy," I laughed. "Actually, it almost looks as though you've gotten bigger."

"I've been training, that's all." It had to have been some pretty severe training, with the muscles I could see even from the outside of that set of less than flattering robes.

"Learn anything fun?"

"Of course."

"Show me."

"I've changed a lot in the last month," he muttered, pulling the oversized zanpakutou from his back. Then that mask fell over his features and my world was thrown into confusion.

* * *

I will admit I got a little out of control. I let my wild side loose and became so hot headed and blood crazy that I shoved Pantera through his arm before nearly killing the raven haired girl again. I am pretty sure her name is Rukia. I was six kinds of angry when the blond man showed up and kicked my ass so hard I was about to rip out Pantera's true form. I am glad I didn't, I really loose control when I end up doing that.

Only a day after I was almost destroyed by the boy's comrade, I was truly saved. The human woman worked her black magic and restored not only my arm but my tattoo, my sanity and my soul. I shoved that new arm through Luppi and my male instinct completely took over. That desire to completely dominate something makes me so hard.

Either way, Luppi had what was coming to him. Her. It.

I returned to the human world shortly after that. Something about him was different. He wasn't the Ichigo I remembered fighting originally, and he certainly wasn't the same person I spent hours on a roof with. A sense of commonality surrounded him this time, as if he was dancing between the now blurred line of shinigami and hollow. It almost seemed as though he was someone I should be fighting along side, not against.

Anything above gillian is formed by piling souls on top of each other until they become such a dense mass they collapse, which is basic physics. However, with each soul consumed, that sense of self becomes further away and the hollow bind closer together, if only to save that idealization of what we should be. Around those who are different, you understand who you truly are.

But I'm sick of being around the arrancar. They make me angrier than I should be, pushing my outward violence to levels I've not experienced before. However, the boy was something different. I'd never seen anything like him before, how similar we actually were was frightening.

Of course, he was livid when I jumped through a window and landed straight into a room that I am guessing was his. Just being in the same general area as him sets my senses ablaze.

"What in the fucking hell are you doing here?" he almost screamed at me.

"I came to tell you the great news!" I said with a grin.

"What, that you didn't kill Orihime? That is great fucking news, asshole."

"I don't even know who that is, pay attention," it never occurred to me that he would actually be angry about the disappearance of the woman.

"How the fuck can you not know who that is, I'm pretty sure she is just about the only person who could magically sew and arm back onto your disgustingly attractive body," Ichigo hissed at me.

"Oh, so THAT is the woman's name. I've been meaning to thank her, but that is what I've come to tell you. Wait, did you just say I have an 'attractive body'?" I had missed that the first time around. Selective hearing is something I've perfected since Aizen began his reign of terror.

"I didn't say that. I'm angry at you, leave me alone."

"Passive aggressive much?" He was pissing me off. It may have been his goal.

"You kidnapped one of my best friends! How can you blame me?" he yelled at me. God, he's sexy when he's angry.

"I didn't have anything to do with it. In case you've forgotten, I've been left out of the party planning for about a month now."

"Guilty by association."

I walked over to the door frame he was standing in and completely invaded his personal bubble. "I want to go back to the part where you commented on hot sexy I am."

A red blush crept across his face as he stuttered a hasty response, "I didn't say anything of the sort."

"Then what was it that I heard?"

"Something I accidentally said, it meant nothing," he retorted, shifting his eyes to the floor.

I grabbed the back of his hair and jerked his face upward as he winced in pain as I held onto those soft orange locks. Those chocolate eyes were burning holes into my face as he stared back at me with contempt, challenging me to make my move. I almost let him go and walked from the room. I almost left him there to fall back into his pit of self loathing.

Almost.

I pressed my lips against his instead, suddenly leaving all conscientious thought in a void of space and time I don't go to on a regular basis. He didn't struggle against me but he didn't fall into me either. Kissing him wasn't quite what I expected.

It certainly wasn't bad though. Actually, it was probably the most erotic kiss I'd ever shared with anyone. So plain and chaste, as I pulled my lips from his soft skin and glanced down at him, I wanted more. I needed to dive further into that boy like it was my job. He stared at the wall behind me as I let my fingers run down the short hair on the back of his neck.

The only thing that made me want more was his complete lack of emotion. I needed to continue until I knew what was running through his mind. Needed to know if he was as wildly turned on as I was. I shoved him roughly against the closed door and ground our bodies together as I pressed my lips against him again. He finally reacted, moving his head so slightly no normal person would notice. But it gave me every opportunity I needed.

I moved deeper into him as he plastered both hands to the door he was crushed against. I scraped a palm up his chest as we gasped for breath. I moved my lips to his thick neck and he balled one of his hands into a fist while the other slid up my back, leaving a streak of fire screaming on my skin.

I bit down slightly on his tender flesh and he made a small groan out of the bottom of his throat. I continued to press my body into his as we ran our lips against one another with hunger. We parted only momentarily as I pulled his shirt over his head before we collapsed together again. The tender skin of my scarred chest felt as though it was going to melt off my body as I pressed our chests together with an ache that was thickening.

Nothing perfect can last forever though. A small knock came at the other side of the door, followed by a child's voice. "Onii-chan, are you coming down for dinner?"

He turned his head to the side and left me kissing the air, which of course made me feel very silly. "Yeah, Yuzu. Give me a few more minutes and I will be down to eat with you."

"Okay, no hurry. I just don't want it to be cold!" she said quickly before her feet pattered down the hallway.

I had both of my hands planted on either side of his head with his white shirt still hanging from my palm. Ichigo glanced up at me with an indifferent expression and spoke slowly, "I can't do this right now."

"When can you do it?" I asked quietly.

"Never. I can't do this, period."

"You are lying, Ichi," I muttered as I lowered my lips to his ear and felt a shiver run through his body.

"I am not lying, I can't do it."

"Can't, or won't?"

He faltered then, hesitating slightly as his chocolate eyes shifted back to the floor. "I won't do this, Grimmjow," he said in a surprisingly calm voice. "I won't hurt myself like this."

"You know I wouldn't hurt you though," I found myself saying with sincere honestly.

He sighed then and gave me a sad smile, "I know you won't intentionally, but you seem to be forgetting what we are."

I never forgot what we were. Hollow and Shinigami, locked in an eternal battle for supremacy, each side believing it is right and the other is wrong. I wanted to tell him that I didn't care and I needed to continue our story, even if it resulted in my destruction.

I didn't tell him this though. Ichigo just pulled his shirt back over his head and vanished through the door, leaving me standing in the empty room pondering what exactly had just happened. I ended up taking out my pent up sexual frustration on one of Halibel's fraccions that night, but it didn't really help.

Before I knew it, I was reunited with the kid. But it wasn't quite the way I'd hoped our collision would occur. I always imagined that he would still be alive.

* * *

AN : I can't decide if I'm happy with this chapter or not. I want to go into details about their second fight, but I don't want to at the same time. And I want to write about his return to the Espada, but we've already seen it so I don't want to. xD I'm lame, I know.

Review or I'll hunt you down and give you a great big cunt punt.


	5. Chapter 5

AN : In this chapter, actual story line ends and my imagination begins. roffle waffle.

* * *

I shoved my foot under his chest and rolled his carcass over with an unfamiliar pang riding through me. All of my fears were confirmed as those chocolate eyes stared at nothing with a glaze, the hole in his chest seeping blood down onto the white washed floor. The woman that was stolen from the human world began her work on him, healing up the broken limbs and torn skin as if she brought people back from the edge of death on a daily basis.

I had told her to heal Ichigo because I just wanted to turn around and beat his ass again, but I'm a liar. I didn't want Ichigo to die in that place, and I certainly didn't want him to die before I did. She, Inoue, really pissed me off when she refused to heal him after I dumped that bastard Ulquiorra off into another dimension. I was so livid that I almost choked the life out of her, but he stopped me. It was as if God reached down into this place of morbidity and sorrow and gave him another chance at life, which he immediatly used to piss me off. And she healed him. And then she healed me.

And then, of course, we fought. I pulled out Pantera and sunk the metal into his flesh just as many times as he sank Zangetsu into mine. I lost myself completely in the battle, he was no longer Ichigo, he was a masked soldier making an attempt at my life. I almost killed the woman then, but he saved her life and a pain ripped through my body when I came to the realization that he could, possibly, adore her as he would a lover.

I was so bloodied up at the end of our fight. He saved me though, I watched as that sad sense of urgency traced his beautiful features when he landed that final strike. I couldn't even maintain my released form as I started my fall from power, but he saved me there. I could feel his hand wrapped around my wrist as I sank closer to the white sand. It was a powdery mess that ground grit into every wound in my body, still warm from the ever present sun in that canopy of Las Noches.

Just as Nnoitra appeared, something screamed through my bones. That man would kill Ichigo if I didn't do something, anything. Of course, I was so torn up that he just sank his blade into my shoulder as though I were a piece of clay. Ichigo watched with panic as the bastard rose his sword for a second attack, and just as I collapsed in a fit of unconscious behavior, he saved my life. With God, Nnoitra and the woman as our witness.

It was never the same after that.

* * *

When I finally came around to the world of the conscious again, several things nailed me at once.

First, the only Espada left in the area was Yami, which surprised me. Second, when I opened my eyes with a groan, I was in a rather dark place with someone hovering in my face. Scared the living shit out of me, I almost screamed. I held it in though, which I'm glad I did because it turned out to be Ichigo and I really don't need him thinking I'm a woman.

"Thank God you are awake," he said quietly.

I groaned and ran a set of fingers through my blood crusted hair, "Ya miss me or something?"

"No, I just wanted to give you this," he grumbled. Just as he finished the sentence, something large and rather bony slammed into the side of my face like a freight truck. I rolled over onto my side, spit up a fresh amount of blood and clenched my teeth to make the dull pain go away.

"What in the fuck was that for?" I halfway screamed at him.

"Don't yell at me, asshole," he smarted at me, as if I should automatically know what crawled up his ass. The boy is such a woman sometimes.

"Then you had better tell me why you completely embarrassed me in front of that asshole AND the woman, and then drug me off to this dark wherever this is just to punch me in the fucking face," I snapped, still laying with my back facing him and my hands over my throbbing jaw bone. A dull breeze swept through the room and for the first time I became conscious of my lack of torso covering.

"Because you lost your fucking mind and I had to save you from that other Arrancar," he spat.

I finally sat up and crossed my legs, "Don't you even fucking go there, shinigami. The only reason I lost my mind in the first place is because you thought it would be cute to-"

"Fuck you! This isn't my fault! I'm sorry I fucking enjoy your company enough to stop someone from KILLING YOU. In case you didn't know, it's sort of IRREVERSIBLE," he screamed.

I stopped and narrowed my eyes, staring at him through the dark room. I knew I could see him a lot better than he could see me and all the fidgeting he was doing was fucking adorable.

"Tch, I'd rather be dead than have a whelp save my life," I spoke through the dark. I shouldn't have said it, because I had a hand wrapped around my already bruised throat and my back against a wall within a split second. Little bastard is quick.

"Don't make me regret this, I will end you," Ichigo growled.

The sad part was, that in the condition I was in, he really could have just choked the life out of me and there would have been very little I could have done about it. When it comes to that man, my bark is always worse than my bite. After that moment in time, I knew I'd never be able to surpass him. And yet, after that moment in time, he'd always do whatever I told him. Weird.

"Go ahead and do it," I snarked at him, trying to push him to a breaking point.

"Don't try me, I will," he said, his face moving closer to mine.

"I want you to, there is no way I'll be allowed to live after this whole incident anyway," I laughed, knowing that what I was telling him was true and that he definitely didn't believe me.

I don't know what changed in him then, whether he had let out enough frustration or he felt bad for me or a combination of the two, but his thick fingers left my trachea and slid across the battered expanse of my chest. He traced the curves of my halfway healed shoulder wound Nnoitra gave me, careful not to touch the areas still scabbing.

"How do you heal so quickly?" he asked, the anger in his voice gone. I shuddered slightly as the pads of his fingers ran against the edge of the scar he had given me almost a month ago.

"I'm an Espada, Ichigo," I laughed at him, knowing that he knew the answer already. "Something like this will keep me down for the remainder of a fight but I'll be right as rain in, like, a day."

"That had to have broken clean through your collar bone, it was so deep," he muttered, resting his head on my undamaged shoulder. He watched through the dim light as his fingers ran across my naked chest. His soft hair was brushing against my jaw like it was supposed to be there.

"Of course it broke though the bone, you saw that shit, hurt like a mother fucker too," I added, letting a smile cross my features.

"I'm sorry I embarrassed you," he muttered, letting his body fall against mine more heavily. "I just refuse to watch you die."

"But if you aren't around I'm allowed to die?" I smiled.

"Something like that," he said quietly.

I pulled my arm across my chest and wrapped it around his shoulders, turning his body against mine. We stood there, with his cheek resting in the crook of my neck and my arms around the lower half of his body, like we did this sort of thing every single day. My senses were on fire, mostly between his heat pouring into me like a drug and my chest feeling as though it was about to expel my lungs in a fit of anger because I was pushing my injuries again. I didn't care though, he probably would have just ended up saving me somehow.

"Grimm," he spoke in hushed tones, "kiss me again, like you did the other night."

"Promise you won't run away from me this time?" I laughed.

I felt a smile cross his face then, "Yeah, I promise."

I didn't even need to coerce him into it that time, we made our moves quickly, quietly and without hesitation. Kissing him is like seeing a beautiful work of art, that fleeting feeling of being completely overwhelmed by the beauty of the entire piece makes every one of your emotions suddenly very confused. I didn't know how to feel as his lips moved against mine, should I have felt loved? Lonely? Happy? The whole situation was so bittersweet it almost made me want to stop.

As I deepened the kiss with a sick desperation, he snaked his arms around my waist, letting the tips of his fingers curve around the hole that was punched through my abdomen. It was, possibly, the biggest turn on in my entire life, just having those tiny pieces of warmth touching the sensitive skin so lightly. I was hard as a rock in a flash, a groan leaving the bottom of my chest as his free hand raked at my tattoo. My usual steel skin felt as though it was being liquefied and could melt off my body at any second. Something was wrong, the whole situation was so very, very wrong that it became so perfectly right.

Just as I grabbed at his dick through those loose black robes, yet another female's voice ruined the moment completely.

"Um, excuse me? Kurosaki-kun, are you here?" the woman spoke through the dark.

I know I let out a frustrated groan at that moment in time. I could hear her footsteps through the room as she wandered around in the dark. I didn't let go of Ichigo right away though, I pressed my lips into his ear and whispered quietly, "We will finish this later." His only response to me was a sharp intake of breath and his short nails digging into my back briefly before we separated and he walked toward the woman.

"I'm right here, Inoue," he called out to the woman in a shaky voice. I'm still proud of my ability to do that to him.

"Oh, there you are," she said with a grin. "How is Grimmjow-kun doing?"

I stopped and furrowed my brow at her, "Kun? When the fuck did we get to be such great friends, woman?"

She just stared at me for a second before completely ignoring my comment and shifting her attention back to Ichigo. What a little bitch. "Yami refused to cooperate after you killed Ulquiorra-"

"You did what now?" I half screamed at the boy, only to get a hand shoved in my face as if I were a school girl.

"Why aren't Byakuya and Zaraki just beating it out of him?" Ichigo asked. I had no idea who these people were, but I didn't like the sound of it.

"Well, Byakuya-sama is tending to Rukia, and Yachiru-chan told me that her captain won't do anything with Yami because he's not formidable enough as an opponent, or something like that."

"Why the hell did you kill Ulquiorra and why wasn't I informed of this right away?" I snapped again.

He wheeled on me with fire in his eyes, "He pissed me off, so I killed him. Why is it such a big deal?"

"Because I was gonna kill that fucker!" It's true. I was going to do it one day. Rip that stupid helmet right off his stupid head and watch as he writhed on the floor. And now I can't do it.

"You are going to kill everyone, according to you," Ichigo smirked at me.

The woman shifted her eyes from me to Ichigo and back to me again with a wonderful look of confusion on her face. "Either way, I need to get both of you healed up."

"I'll be fine, woman. I don't need you doing that voodoo on me again," I said, moving toward the pale streak of light that lead outside.

"Grimmjow-kun, I need to heal that horrid wound or-"

"Seriously, when did we become best friends? You have got to stop that. Maybe Grimmjow-sama would be alright, but I'm really just partial to Grimmjow. Maybe Grimm if you are feeling bold," I half snapped, have sneered at her.

"Well, I just thought you were a friend of Kurosaki-kun's after he saved you from falling to your death, and then saved you from Nnoitra, and then brought you here so you could try to sleep it all off," she said slowly, twiddling her fingers.

I turned on him quickly, shoving a finger into his chest plate like it was my job, "Do you see what you did to me, boy? You turned me into Grimmjow-kun. Thank you, so much, oh lord and master of my fucking social life!"

"Don't bite my head off, we already had this discussion," he said with an exasperated tone.

"What conversation?" she asked suddenly.

"Nothing Inoue, it was just a quick talk we had," he said.

"Oh, is that what you two were whispering to each other when I came in? I was wondering why you were so close," she suddenly trailed off and I watched in utter amusement as his face paled in horror when Kurosaki Ichigo realized what Inoue Orihime had actually seen.

"Yeah, Inoue, that is exactly what you saw," I said, turning to look at her with a big grin on my features. "I was just thanking Ichigo for everything he's done for me," he made a noise that sounded like he was being strangled, "I am so grateful, but I couldn't have anyone know, lest it hurt my pride. So I had to whisper in his ear." At that moment, I leaned down and rested my lips against her ear and lowered my voice so that Ichigo could barely hear what I was speaking, "Maybe sometime I will whisper in your ear too."

He smacked me across the back of my skull as he walked by, "Come on, asshole. Stop bothering her."

Inoue was staring at the floor with wide eyes as I pushed around her and chased after Ichigo. "I just couldn't help it, Ichi!"

"Don't call me that."

"Ichi-kun?"

"That is terrible, I liked it better when you called me asshole."

"Speaking of ass, how abo-"

"NO."

* * *

AN : In unrelated news, I found a writer of GrimmIchi stuff that might actually trump my writing style. Not to say that I'm badass or anything, but have you read the usual GrimmIchi stuff? Horrid. It's what makes me hate 14 year old girls and the standard fanbase of Bleach. Anywho, look up Gnat on AdultFanFiction. Trust me on this one, I'm way picky and usually let bad authors know just how terrible they are, but she rocked my socks clean off.

Reviews prease.


	6. Chapter 6

AN : I recently broke up with the boyfriend figure of about a year and a half, so I've just been writing to keep myself busy. It's weird suddenly having free time away from a boy.

* * *

I had my head slammed down into that white sand a few seconds after I walked out of whatever building Ichigo brought me to recuperate in. Standing above me with a foot planted firmly against the back of my neck was a tall, ripped man with crazy hair and a tiny, pink haired girl hanging off his shoulder.

"Oi, Kurosaki, is this the one that tried to kill ya?" he yelled at Ichigo, who ended up just brushing off the question.

"Several times," he said as he kept walking away, "but try not to kill him. You know we might need his help."

"Get the fuck off of me!" I started yelled as he continued to step on the back of my neck, holding down my broken body.

"Now, now, Berry-kun, you should stop struggling so much or Ken-chan really will hurt you!" the little girl said happily as she pounced off his shoulder and poked me in the forehead. I saw red as she bounded away and jumped on Ichigo's back.

The group was close enough I could still hear their conversation, even if I was restrained by the giant oaf of a man holding me down.

"What's going on?" Ichigo asked the captain with a six splashed across his back.

"Rukia is struggling, Inoue Orihime is doing what she can. I have put the supposed 10th Espada under lock and key until we can manage a way out of here, I can only imagine Kurotsuchi will want his body for research," the man said with a very, VERY bored complexion.

"Has he done anything to cooperate yet?" Ichigo asked, crossing his arms.

"Absolutely nothing, were you able to confirm cooperation from the remaining Espada?"

"I haven't even asked him yet."

My interest was peaked. "What are they talking about?" I asked the crazy man above me.

"Seems like your ruler, Aizen, decided to slam shut our way home. So we are stuck here until you or that giant Espada decide to open up a way home," he laughed, as if he was enjoying the predicament he was in.

"Shit, all you had to do was ask, I'm game as long as it pisses Aizen off," I said with a laugh. I was telling the truth. I didn't care what I did, he would end up killing me either way.

"OI! BYAKUYA! THIS ONE SAYS HE WILL HELP!" he yelled as I felt the sudden relief of having a size fourteen foot lift off the back of my head. I stood up on shaky legs and walked over to the group.

"This doesn't mean we trust you," Byakuya said, again with the bored complexion.

"I wouldn't trust me either," I spoke coolly, staring at Ichigo with desire.

The next few events made me feel very, very stupid. I went to open a way for them to get home, and nothing happened. I was just standing there, touching the air, but nothing was going on. I furrowed my brow, shook my hand like it would help and tried again. Still nothing.

Ichigo, king of the intelligent that we all know he is, grabbed my finger and stared at it. "Maybe it's broken," he said.

"I don't think it quite works like that," Byakuya muttered.

"I dunno what's wrong, it's not like that ass face Aizen can just take away my power to open Garganta," I muttered. "Maybe I should go see if Yami can open them, it might not be just me."

The tiny pink haired girl suddenly interjected, "But earlier, when we were talking to the big Espada-man, he tried to do the same thing but nothing happened. Ken-chan just thought he was messin' with us and knocked him unconscious."

"Oh that is great," Ichigo sighed.

"Wait, so we are stuck here?" Orihime managed to say with wide eyes.

"It would seem that Aizen has made all travel impossible for the moment," Byakuya stated.

"But we need to get back and help everyone!" Ichigo half yelled.

"Hey, it's not his fucking fault, don't loose your damned temper," I snapped at him, just as pissed about the situation as he was. I really didn't want to be the only damned Espada left, let alone be stuck in the hell hole that is Hueco Mundo with a bunch of sniveling shinigami.

"Fine. We are locked in," Ichigo muttered under his breath, "But you had better try to open a damned way out of here every minute until we can leave." He was waving a finger in my face like he was suddenly the king of everything.

I didn't really mind having him boss me around. Of course, for the sake of saving face, I was instantly offended. "Don't you dare tell me what the fuck to do, boy."

"If you two would stop bickering like school children, that would be fantastic," Byakuya interjected. "I would like to get Rukia out of the heat and somewhere Inoue Orihime could work on her in silence."

"Whatever," I said, pissed that I couldn't keep arguing with my favorite hobby, "Las Noches is huge. There has to be some place to dump her worthless carcass."

"I don't think you are really helping your cause by telling a captain that his sister has a worthless-" Ichigo began, thinking he knew everything.

"Yeah, whatever," I interrupted, "As far as I can tell, I'm the only person around these parts that can help ya'll out, even in the least." I turned my back and began walking toward the building that had all the living quarters, throwing my hand up to get them to follow. "I'll take my chances by calling the woman worthless, because in the end she really didn't accomplish much, did she?"

As I led the pitiful group toward the rooms that used to house the now missing or dead Espada, secretly wishing they all would drop dead so I could finish what I started with the Strawberry. Luck is never on my side though.

* * *

"Moment of truth, Ichi," I muttered, leaning heavily on the door frame to my room. "Wanna take ol' Emocar's room? Or you can always stay in here and baby my broken body back to health."

"Because that is definitely something I want to do right now," he jeered.

"Your biting sarcasm is going to get you in big trouble one of these days," I sighed, turning my back on the boy and vanishing into my room. I let a smile trace my features as I meandered into the bedroom to get out of the torn and bloody remains of my uniform. He hadn't left my door, just stood there with his arms folded and his shoulder against the white washed stone wall.

"Change your mind about leaving?" I asked from the side room as I peeled away the cloth stuck into my wounds, wincing as the scabs reopened and blood began seeping down my legs.

"No, I'm just making sure you are alright before I go," he lied. "I don't want you dying on us when you are our ticket out of here." He was always such a terrible liar.

I finally managed to get out of my hakama without too much pain. I listened carefully as I heard his feet patter across the concrete floor and his body sink onto the couch. I turned on the shower and stepped into the hot water, suddenly grateful for the sting it left in my cuts. I could feel him, sitting there, unmoving and quiet. I raked my fingers through my hair, watching as the water washed away the sand and scarlet. When the water finally changed from crimson to pink to clear, I twisted the knobs and pulled a towel over my head.

And, of course, walked straight out the door. I couldn't stop my feet from moving under me, and I'm not entirely sure that even if I could have stopped that I would have wanted to. He had his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. Ichigo turned those brilliant amber eyes at me for a split second before returning them to the floor. I could see it, even through the pale light, the blush that crept across his cheeks.

"Put some damned clothes on," he spoke to the floor.

"Pfft, this is how I roll when I'm here, why would I change my ways for you?" I laughed.

"Because I am here, and that's weird," Ichigo muttered again to the concrete.

I shook the water out of my hair before wrapping the towel around my waist, giving into his meager protests. "You want something else to wear? I bet Emocar has some shit that would fit you."

He didn't respond.

"No really, your shinigami garb has to be full of sand and blood and jizz now that you've seen me naked, and that can't be comfortable," I laughed, walking back to put something on.

Silence.

"You gonna talk to me?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I don't feel like it."

"What do you feel like doing?"

"Changing might be a good idea."

I smirked at the comment. "I know I'm hot shit, but I was just joking about the jizz thing."

He glanced up at me as I played with my damp hair, "I know it was a joke. Nothing of the sort happened."

"Man, calling Doctor Grumpy-pants to room 106," I said with a confused look, "What the fuck crawled up your ass?"

"You did."

"Oh, if only, Ichi. If only."

He rolled his eyes, scoffed and walked from the room. But I didn't miss the smile plastered across his face.

* * *

I was laying on the couch when he returned, with a bare foot thrown over the arm rest and a knee bent, reading a book I stole from the human world.

"Have you tried opening a Garganta again?" Ichigo asked quietly.

Without pulling my eyes away from the German words plastered across the page, I pointed at the wall and summoned a portal. Of course, nothing happened. Aizen wouldn't let me open one until he was good and ready to deal with the shinigami on this side of reality.

"It would seem that I'm a huge failure," I mocked, eyes still glued to the paper.

"German? You read German?" he said incredulously as he walked into the room.

"You sure are thick. You do realize my name is very, very German, right?" I laughed, finally pulling my eyes away from the book to glance at him.

"I thought all you guys were Spanish or something," he said, shrugging his shoulders.

"Some of us are, some of us are Japanese, some of us are Canadian, why does it matter?"

"I guess it doesn't really matter, I was just surprised, that's all," his innocence spoke.

I stared at him for a few seconds, glancing at how strangely fitting Ulquiorra's uniform looked on him. It wouldn't be ill fitting for him to actually be an Espada, branded with a number and thrown into a world of war. Of course, I wouldn't be so drawn to him had he died and turned out that way.

"Looks good on you," I muttered before going back to my book.

"The sleeves are a little too short, but I'll manage," he laughed.

I ignored him to finish up the chapter I was reading. It wasn't really a mind stimulating book, but I really enjoyed feeling his eyes boring into the scar plastered across my naked chest. I know that I am vain when it comes to how attractive I am, but it's so nice to have it confirmed on a daily basis.

"Five bucks to stare in public, shinigami," I managed to spit out before the heat burning in my bones became unbearable.

"God, sorry. I was just wondering where the scar I gave you ended and the one I saved you from started." The boy thinks he's so deep and intellectual sometimes.

"The one you gave me never ends, boy," I said quietly, no longer reading the words on the page but still staring at the book.

He turned his back at the comment and began walking back to the door, his steps echoing through the stone room. "Goodnight, Grimm."

I hadn't had a good night in years.

* * *

AN : Lots of talking this chapter. :o I have a treat for you next chapter though. :wink: CAN YOU HOLD IN THE EXCITEMENT?

Review please!


	7. Chapter 7

* * *

AN : Oh, and shield the children from this chapter, I guess, sort of. Although I can't really do anything about the 14 year olds that will inevitably read this and be torn between their feelings of whether they should consider this hot or an abomination. Oh yes, I went there.

* * *

I was startled awake by my door slamming and feet pattering across the cold floor. Before I could really comprehend what was going on through my sleep ridden eyes, the book still draped across my chest was shoved to the floor and was replaced with a broad expanse of skin. Soft lips fell against mine and hands raked through my hair roughly as I became suddenly more aware of the situation.

"Ich-" I muttered through his lips, "Ichi, what is goin' on?" I couldn't stop kissing him as he straddled my hips and grabbed at my waist possessively.

"This," he muttered into my mouth, "this is going on. Right now."

No second thoughts needed, I grabbed at his back and rolled him straight off that couch and onto the cold floor. I pulled his white arrancar jacket from his skin in a panic, scared that I might loose what it felt like to dive into him. His lips crushed against the thin skin behind my ear and I groaned in the suppressed agony that always came with a growing erection.

As he reached down and yanked the sash from my hakama, I felt it. That feeling I would get when I knew something was wrong but I continued with it anyway. His long fingers traced the underside of my dick leaving chills running up my spine. He was laying under me with a blush across his cheeks, a finger in his mouth, and a hand wrapped around my cock as if he did shit like this every day.

Another clue that something was off. I didn't care though, I kept going. I ran the tips of my teeth across his chest, stopping only briefly to run my tongue across his hard nipples. Ichigo moaned loudly out of the bottom of his chest, "Grimmjow, what do you want?"

There were plenty of things I wanted, but they were all sort of pushed aside as I stared down at him. Everything deep and meaningful I'd wanted to tell him sort of left the room at that moment. I didn't tell him that I just wanted him, however I could get him. I didn't tell him I wanted to stop the war and end the hate if only to appease my inner morality. I didn't tell him I wanted to kiss his face as equals, not as enemies.

"I want you to suck me off," was what I ended up saying. Hell, at that moment, that really was what I wanted. He smiled under our kiss, tangling his hands up in the loose fabric of my hakama and pushing it away from my hips and down around my bent knees.

I felt his hand grab my shoulder and my body began shifting. He rolled over and sat on all fours, sucking on my neck, giving me a taste of just what I would be getting. Ichigo ground his hips into mine, letting the fabric still constraining his erection move against the naked flesh of mine.

"Grimmjow," his voice was distant as I lost myself. His lips ran down my scar and my arousal thickened. "Grimm," closer, was his voice getting closer? Why was it so far away to begin with, he was right there! I didn't care, his breath was leaving it's mark across the ache. "Grimmjow!"

I shot upward, colliding with something very hard, it felt like someone else's head. "What in the FUCK?" I screamed, the room coming into focus. I glanced down to see the couch all around me and a blanket draped around my waist, thankfully. Staring over, I saw those chocolate eyes scanning me with worry.

"Are you okay?" Ichigo asked incredulously.

I groaned, sitting up completely and bunching the blanket around my extremely hard erection. "Yes, I'm fine, what the hell are you doing?"

"Well, you had fallen asleep so I went to get you a blanket, but when I got back it sounded like you were having a nightmare!" he said with what I could only imagine was genuine worry. It's hard to stay mad at him for long, but I was furious at the moment.

"Nope, quite the opposite really," I muttered, laying back down and wrapping my arm around my eyes, desperately trying to calm the fire running through me.

Ichigo is extremely thick sometimes. "What do you mean?"

I didn't really want to explain it to him, but I just blurted out the answer rather bluntly. "Sex. Dream. About you actually." I peeked out from under my arm to watch his eyes widen and his face brighten in the moonlight as he sputtered and became wildly embarrassed. I couldn't help myself as I continued, "It's your damned fault. You are like a woman, always leading me on and never wanting to finish the job."

"I never said that," he replied meekly. A smile ripped across my features as he continued speaking, "It's just not been a great time yet."

I sat up and placed each of my feet on either side of his. As he stood there with concern in his eyes, I wrapped my arms around his waist and pulled his skin flush with my mask free cheek. I sighed softly as his forearms rested on my shoulders and his thick fingers tangled into my sweat slicked hair. "It will never be a good time for you, will it?" I asked the boy.

"Nope, not ever."

"Maybe one of these days I'll get you talked into having a romp with me," I laughed against his stomach.

"Grimm," he said quietly, "it's not that I don't want to, I just can't." God, those words stung as they left his lips.

His fingers continued to fall through my electric hair as I pulled him closer. "Can't, or won't?" I asked him again and smiled as he faltered.

"Can't."

"Bullshit, Kurosaki. Saying you can't do it would imply that you are physically incapable of fucking me, and from what I can tell, you've got all the necessary components," I mocked him as I grabbed his ass with one hand and wrapped my other around his dick, grinning mischievously when he gave me all the carnal reactions I was looking for.

"God, stop it," he muttered as I palmed at his growing member. He struggled to remove himself from me and for a moment I considered taking him whether he liked it or not. Sometimes my instincts just take over.

I stood up and placed my lips over his, smiling as he continued to struggle in vain against my body. Patience was running thin as he continued to try to pull away, desperate to leave the room. It was washing over me though, that desire I would never be able to sedate.

"I want you," I spoke into his mouth as his hands ran down my chest before trying to push me off. "I want to be inside you," I continued, grinning slightly at the embarrassed groans coming from his throat. "I want to make you come over and over," I wasn't in the mood to play his games anymore.

"No, Grimm, stop," he muttered into my ear as I lowered my lips to his thick neck. "Please," he pleaded, "I... I can't."

"Yes you can," I hissed as I slipped a hand under his jacket and let my fingers tease the taut sinew he always kept hidden beneath various forms of clothing. I wanted to see him naked in the light, in the dark, however he would let me. I wanted to spend my time touching and leaving bite marks down every inch of that pale skin.

"Don't," he moaned into the dimly lit room. A small gasp slipped from his lips as mine came in contact with his hip bones. I left him a tiny present for the morning before smiling and moving to kiss him at a downward angle.

"I don't want to hear that word again until it's followed by 'stop,'" I murmured into his ear as I ran kisses across his jaw, slowly making my way to his angelic lips. Pushing his body backward, I smirked as our lips stayed together even as his frame collided with the concrete wall. Desperation was swallowing me and I really didn't know how much longer I could keep the beast under control.

"Please, Grimmjow," he begged as I began working at the knot in his sash.

"Please what," I moaned into his orange locks.

"I really don't," he groaned then as my hand grabbed his extremely hard dick, "I don't want to, not now."

"When," the way I was saying things were no longer questions, they were simple statements.

"I... I don't know," he said with a gasp. I raised my lips to his face, moving to bruise them against his, but he turned. I stopped suddenly, tasting the saline streaking his cheeks. I didn't move, frozen in my sudden epiphany. I couldn't do this to him, not now.

"Stay with me, just tonight," I said quietly, wrapping my arms around his trembling body. "No funny business, I won't try anything."

"I don't trust you," he said quietly.

I smiled against the orange hair tickling my neck, "I'm not going to lie, I want you pretty damn bad," I voiced my realization to him. "But I'm not about to take what I want right now because I want it again and again. And I can't have you if I destroy it now."

"You just now learned that?"

"Fuck you, that was hard to say and now you are making fun of me? I'll do it anyway if you keep this up," I half yelled, half jeered at him. Truth was, at that moment I think my human side finally won a battle for once. I'd never let my own personal pleasure take the side lines before, not even to my conscious, which is why I get in trouble so often. And while it was rather difficult to stop the situation, part of me repeated over and over that it would be better in the long run.

"No you won't," little shit could see through my lies. "I think I would enjoy the company though."

"You'll stay?"

"You have something other than that couch, right?"

"Yes, but rule is you can't be sleeping fully clothed," I laughed, keeping his body in my arms as if I could protect him. What was there to even protect him from? Mostly me and I really wish I could have protected him from my stupidity.

I fell asleep with my cheek pressed against his chest. Ichigo's thick fingers were tangled in my tousled hair and my legs were wrapped around his. And even though I woke up a million and three times in the night with a massive erection, I continued to try to convince myself that it was worth it.

* * *

When I woke up, there was faux sunlight pouring through the one window in my bedroom. All I could hear was a rather angered tutting noise from the bathroom as I sat up and rubbed the sleep from my eyes. I saw the neat pile of Ichigo's discarded arrancar clothes on top of the table in the corner and smiled. Until, of course, he came out with anger in his eyes.

"Do you see this?" he pointed furiously at his hip. I was very sad to see his pants were still on. Maybe part of me had imagined him taking them off in the middle of the night.

"Yes, it looks like someone hit you with a pipe," I said, oblivious of the original origin of the bruise.

"Yeah, if you can call your fucking mouth a pipe," he spat at me before vanishing back into the bathroom. I had completely forgotten about giving him that fantastic work of hickey art.

"If you come have sex with me, you'll forget about it," I murmured before flopping my face back down into the pillows and adjusting my junk so it wasn't pushing into the mattress with such an annoying persistence. I was considering shooing him out of the bathroom and taking care of myself since it was obvious he wasn't going to any time soon.

"You'd like that too much, so I'm going to pass," he called from around the wall. "Have you tried opening a Garganta yet?"

I tried, and failed. He didn't seem to grasp the fact that it wasn't going to work until Aizen returned. But I didn't argue, I was tired from waking up a billion times.

"Can't you come back to bed, it seriously has to be really early," I said into the pillow. Surprisingly enough, I felt the weight shift sink down onto the bed as he tumbled into the sheets with me. I opened one eye to see him laying on his back with his arms behind his head, obviously pondering the meaning of the universe.

"What if Aizen never comes back and we are trapped here forever?" he asked.

"How did you get here in the first place?" I asked him, annoyed at his stupidity. Honestly, I feel like a genius around him sometimes.

"Well, Urahara-san opened a -"

"There is your answer. With all of Soul Society called as backups, Aizen is probably dead or imprisoned," I sighed. "It's only a matter of time before whoever opened the gate for you figures out a way to get us out of here."

"You think so?"

"It would take a technical super genius to even figure out how to get here, I'm sure he'll get it eventually," I laughed. "It's not like you are gonna age in your spiritual body anyway," I added, sighing at his childish behavior.

"That is going to be weird," Ichigo muttered.

"What's going to be weird."

"I'm going to grow old and wrinkly and you will stay young forever."

"You idiot, I'm already dead to begin with," I marveled.

"But you feel so... alive."

I threw an arm over his chest and drug my lips onto his in an attempt to get him to stop spouting nonsense. He didn't move as I kissed him, just sat in silent appreciation as I rested my head on his shoulder and laughed. "Shut the fuck up, shinigami, and go back to sleep before I end you."

* * *

AN : I just finished Ouran High School Host Club. I know, I'm only three years late. But, of course, now I have a twincest fetish. I'll probably go dig up some Shirosaki stuff now. Damnit.

Reviews?


	8. Chapter 8

* * *

AN : Kind of boring chapter. I'm doing a Bleach thing and throwing a filler at your face.

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The days progressed slowly, even slower than they did when I wasn't trapped with excess sexual frustration and shinigami everywhere. They drove me fucking crazy, always bothering me with their stupid questions. I just made up shit half the time, I didn't know how Hueco Mundo worked. Just because I'm a fucking Espada doesn't mean I'm a super genius.

The little group that stayed in Hueco Mundo was funny in a pathetic way. Renji was the stupid one, Zaraki the crazy one, Byakuya the stoic, so on a so forth. Of course, I guess that would make me the violent one, which I'm okay with. I tend to think I'm getting better at suppressing my anger, but sometimes I just can't help myself.

One afternoon on a particularly lazy day almost a week after we'd been trapped, I was out back pummeling Ichigo. I really wouldn't call it sparring, people who spar do it for fun. We were doing it for the simple joy of bloodlust. Just as he slid his zanpakutou through my forearm as if it were wet clay, I smiled and grabbed the collar of his white jacket roughly.

I moved my face to his and tugged at the sword without letting even a trace of the pain show through my grinning features, "This makes me want to fuck you dry," I said bluntly, watching as a bored expression crossed his features.

"Yeah, but you won't," Ichigo said. Brat pissed me off.

"Still doesn't change the fact that I want to, when are you gonna give into this?" I said, shoving him away from my body roughly.

"If you keep this up, it won't be until the second Tuesday of next week."

I honestly didn't get his joke. I really, truly didn't get it. Flew right over my head. "There is only one Tuesday in a week."

"That's the point, dumbass," he scolded me. "You are bleeding everywhere, have Inoue heal it for you."

I didn't want the woman to heal the wound he gave me, I wanted to fuck his brains out. I couldn't pin point the reason I wanted him so badly. Was it his devilish good looks? While he is gorgeous, I'm not usually into guys, so I can't blame it on that. Maybe it was his quick tongue and sharp words, but a lot of the time he just teases me with that mouth.

I eventually figured out that I wanted him because he was denying me. I'm not sure if he even knew what he was actually doing to me, but my complete infatuation with him grew with every passing day. Every time I saw him, even at a distance, I had these vivid images flash through my head, usually detailing just exactly where and how I would bang him.

It was actually really annoying and I thought it would go away once I actually managed to talk him into fucking. That was a nice thought.

* * *

I remember when I told him about my past, or at least what I remember of it at any rate. I think it scared him a little bit.

"So, how old are you?" he asked one night as he lazed on my bed, staring at my ceiling as I poked at my hair in the mirror.

"Fuck, I don't know," I muttered, throughly agitated at the cowlick that suddenly appeared on the side of my head. I know I don't seem like the type of guy that would get pissed off at something like that, but I'm a total narcissist.

"How do you not know? Don't you, like, have a birthday or something?"

"Well of course I do, but it stops mattering once you die," I sighed, turning to face him. "You've also got to remember that I'm not just one soul. I'm the result of thousands of souls piled on top of each other, it just so happened that my soul is the one that started the whole train of events."

He just looked at me stupidly.

I tried to explain it better, but I was never good at putting my thoughts into actual words. "I was a wildly normal human and I died a wildly normal death, but when I died, I just started eating. And all the souls I ate merged together to make this sex machine," I mocked, pointing at my chest.

"I'd hardly call you a machine," Ichigo said sadly.

"Why is that?" I asked, walking over to the bed and climbing atop of him on all fours. It was hardly a sexual movement, but just staring down at his figure as a blush crept across his cheeks was enough to get me going.

"Because you are wild, unpredictable and completely conscious of the terrible choices you make. Machines aren't anything like that, they are under total control of their master, kind of like Ulquiorra," he laughed up at me.

I didn't argue, I knew he was right. Instead, I asked him a question that had really been weighing on my mind. "Why do you seek me out knowing that if I kill you, it's the end. You've got no second chances once you step outside your human body, but if you kill me I'll just end up floating away to Soul Society."

He turned his face to mine, "Would it sound crazy if I told you that somehow I knew you wouldn't kill me?"

"Real smart, coming from someone that just said I was wild and capable of very stupid choices," I retorted.

"I think I'm more use to you alive," Ichigo said, a smile in his voice.

I kissed him then, unable to stop myself as just how strangely cute he was being. And I hate cute. He didn't move to make anything out of the kiss, just sat with his usual demeanor and let me try my damnedest to get into his pants. He had already gotten terribly good at denying me without actually doing anything.

"Why won't you just let yourself go, Ichigo?" I groaned into his ear. "Honestly, the game is getting old."

He shrugged me off, "I've never had sex before and I'm not quite sure I want to do it with you first."

I sat up and leaned back on his hips, staring right at his prone frame under me. "I bet I could give you a good reason for every one of your bad reasons."

"They aren't bad reasons, they are my reasons," Ichigo murmured, blushing slightly.

"Like what."

"Well for starters, you are very, very dead."

I actually didn't have an argument for that one except suggesting that we go ahead and kill him too, but I didn't say anything. "Fine, you win. But you've really never fucked anyone before?"

"Nope."

"A guy as attractive as you and you haven't even got an uggo?"

"I'm 15, of course I haven't doinked anyone, not even an uggo."

"Shit, you look a lot older than that," I muttered, not that it mattered to me anyway, not like I could get arrested.

"I get that a lot."

I leaned down and kissed him again, diving into that chastity for what felt like the millionth time, half way expecting him to suddenly just change his mind about the entire ordeal. Just as I push my tongue through his thin lips and smiled when his hand began slithering up my back, it happened.

That changing in aerial pressure, I could feel it because I was a Hollow. I jumped off the bed in a hurry, ignoring the fact my feet were naked as they slammed down on the concrete as I ran toward the nearest door, Ichigo screaming out something I wasn't paying attention to. Sonido wasn't moving my legs fast enough, no matter how fast I was, Las Noches was massive. I saw the tiny door at the end of the white tunnel and growled.

With labored breathing and aching toes, I slammed the doors open and stared at the black mark staining the cloudless sky. To my relief, it wasn't Aizen. Unfortunately, it was several rather powerful shinigami who didn't give a second thought as the back of my head cracked against the stone floor and a zanpakutou was shoved through my very unarmed throat.

* * *

AN : Real men get stabbed through the throat.

Review!


	9. Chapter 9

AN : Hide the children, shield their eyes and probably their ears. Totally the most random sex ever, but it was either now or never. xD I wrote this chapter listening to 3OH!3, which is basically two white guys making fun of rappers by rapping better than them. CHOKECHAIN is easily the best rap song I've heard in years. I was real lazy and didn't beta this chapter as anally as I should have. I apologize for any real terrible mistakes that you see.

* * *

Bound and gagged was not the greatest way to wake up, but at least I woke up. I couldn't talk real well, which was pretty understandable seeing that I had some sort of metal shoved through my throat at some point in the past day or so. I wasn't real sure what day it was or even what time of day it could have possibly been, I was in a dark room with no windows. I struggled out of the ropes around my wrists, my usual strength waning at the extreme blood loss I'm certain I suffered.

Something was moving beside me, but I couldn't really see what it was. I crawled over to the lump with sharp pains riding through my entire body, curiosity driving me forward. It's a terrible pun to say that curiosity did, in fact, kill the cat.

It groaned when I prodded it's limp form. Where had I heard that moan before? Realization dawned on me when that same sound flashed through all the wrong parts of my memory.

"Ichigo?" I muttered painfully with confusion. Why in the hell was he locked in a dark room with me? I was certain at that moment that someone was testing me.

"Shit, where are we?" he asked slowly, sitting up and rubbing his head.

I just shrugged, it hurt too much to talk. He didn't see me though, the room was too black.

"Wait, you are alive? That can't be right," Ichigo said confoundedly. "Are you still an Espada?" he asked as he reached up and laid his hands over my mask. I could almost feel the tension lift from his shoulders as his long fingers rested on the bone, lingering even when he pulled them back. Not being able to form words was suddenly the worst thing I'd ever been through as I felt his chest heave and could smell the tears.

I did all I could think to do. I reached out, feeling for his body. I yanked his shoulders toward my torso and rested my cheek in the crook of his thick neck, suddenly wondering what I was doing.

"God, I thought you were dead," he said quietly. "I watched Soi Fong stand over your body as you bled all over the white floor," he spoke with tiny quivers, his tears gone and replaced with something else. Fear? Hardly, that boy was scared of nothing. But at that exact moment, I realized exactly where we were and why he was locked in a dark room with me.

"I couldn't stop," Ichigo muttered, "I went crazy. It took four of them to hold me down before I even stopped struggling. All I could see was you, laying face down on that concrete with her zanpakutou still sticking out of you like you were a human pin-cushion."

I was actually furious with him, I couldn't understand why he would sacrifice his future and his freedom over a complete waste of space like me. I didn't even need him, like him or love him, he was just a passing infatuation that I would grow tired of sooner or later. He was a good kid and he shouldn't have made such a rash choice, but I couldn't exactly scold him about it because he was shifting moods yet again.

"I don't want to feel the regret I did when I thought you were gone," his words were different. I'd not heard him use that tone before, except in my tainted fantasies. And oh god, they were about to come true. His lips were on mine before I could push him away, no longer soft and chaste but dangerous and filled with desire. He was so drunk on his inability to think rationally that he completely ignored my actual well being and assumed that, even though I hadn't spoken but one word to him, I was perfectly healthy and up to the challenge of teaching him a thing or two about the more carnal aspects of our growing relationship.

I still couldn't tell him no, and I'm not sure I would have if I actually had the ability to do so. The past two months of my total frustration grabbed me like a vice, swallowing me whole and clamping down around every part of my body. No words were spoken, there didn't need to be vocalization of just exactly what was going on. Our conversation was nothing more than teeth on skin and fingernails in hair.

It didn't hurt anymore, all my senses had been replaced with a punch drunk desire I let take over me. I suddenly didn't care that Ichigo and I were probably stuck in a Soul Society dungeon for fraternization. The question of why they put us in the same cell no longer bothered me, the thought of being caught only drove me further. Tongues running against each other with a velvet plush, I stripped his jacket off in one fluid movement. The scar plastered across my chest was inflamed as our skin collided.

To anyone watching, it would have looked like desperation. Our need to be within each other greater than our capability to stop and ask questions, he was moaning under me like we'd been separated for months. I absentmindedly sank my teeth into the flesh of his shoulder when he grabbed my thick erection that I had no control over. Metallic liquid stained my mouth as his hands raked my back, leaving bright red trails across the skin that would last for days.

Our breathing was already labored when I yanked at the fabric holding back the naked flash I wanted to touch. His inability to tell me to stop as I dragged lips across his pale skin was one of the greatest triumphs of my natural dead life. With his dick in my mouth and my fingers half way own his throat, I almost smiled. He didn't taste like strawberries, he tasted like youth and prolonged need.

His hands were clawing and yanking at my hair as I took him just as far as I could without really bothering my already wounded throat. My hand was clamped over his mouth, stifling the moans that would come out and expose our secret. I was moving fast enough that even had he changed his mind about doing it then and there, it would have been too late. Just as he arched his back against the cold floor, I lost it completely, there wasn't any stopping what was happening.

I was licking the sex off of him as I haphazardly tugged away the cloth keeping me back like a gate. With one hand planted on the floor next to his face, I pulled the other away from his mouth to guide myself into him. The groan that ripped through the room was deafening as I pushed into his difficult body. I pushed his knees closer to his chest, desperate to make the whole ordeal better for both of us. My face was against his, sweat mingling with the pained tears running down his cheeks as I continued to plunge into him.

He was so tight, it was probably a bad idea to have gone in without at least trying to stretch him at all, but I didn't care. I needed him, I needed to be in him and have him wrap his calves around my waist while I kissed him into silence. He finally gave a sigh of what sounded like relief that gave me the cue to start our violent dance. One arm under his lower back and the other flush with the floor, I ground into him like I'd never get another chance. I should have been relieved that my frustration was finally being sedated, but I wasn't anywhere close to happy.

Every time I pushed into his body and his walls crashed around my dick, I was that much closer. I ran a hand over the base of his dick, smiling at the agonizing moan he responded with. I had no idea what he was feeling as I jerked him off, but if the sounds he was trying to muffle were any indication, it sure as hell didn't hurt him anymore. My free hand was gripping his waist possessively, my hips were melting against his as he moaned my pet name through the room.

I pushed my lips against his, our movements sloppy and uncoordinated. I was loosing myself in him, the fleeting feeling of the oncoming release barreling at me like a freight train. Tell-tale spasms were ripping though the lithe body under me and I knew he couldn't have been far behind me. He stopped moving completely and moaned into my mouth one last time, that thick trail of liquid dripping down my fingers as I stopped thinking about what I was doing. I pushed into him once more, burying myself as far as his tight body would let me.

It was easily the hottest, most intense orgasm I'd ever had. Months of tension were spilled out all out once with a grunt and heavy breathing. The world came crashing back down around me as I lay in wonder at how his legs had wrapped around my waist and when I had let him scratch at my back so hard I could feel the blood dripping off the skin, or was that sweat? I moved slowly, perching on my knees between his and pushing the hair from my eyes with my clean hand.

I inwardly cursed at myself for not lasting longer. Maybe it was the situation, the boy, or the two month tease, but I should have been able to go for quadruple the time I actually managed. Being able to fuck for hours was always something I'd prided myself on. Although, it probably was for the best. I'm not sure if he could have handled it for that long.

I still had my hakama on, if you could call being draped around my knees still on. Coincidently enough, he still had his on, if only one leg. I pulled out of him in the stunned silence, using my already semen covered hand to clean myself off as best as possible. He didn't speak, didn't make a sound as he moved to pull the cloth back over his body, obviously embarrassed. Or angry. I couldn't tell.

Fumbling around in the dark for my sash as I loosely held the top of my pants around my hips, a sudden light ripped through the room and nearly blinded me for a moment. I glanced down at my own body, broken and bleeding from not only struggling against a zanpakutou through my throat but fucking Ichigo as well. The silhouette in the door way immediately pissed me right the fuck off as it walked toward me.

Ichigo scrambled to pull his pants back on like we actually had a chance to talk our way out of this one. Just one look at the boy proved otherwise, with his tousled hair, bite marks littering his shoulders and jizz dripping down his abdomen, but he still tried.

"It's not what it looks like!" he spit out suddenly as the spiky headed figure continued his war path straight at me.

"Ichigo, you are a fucking idiot, I'm not so stupid that I can't see what it looks like is exactly what it is," the deep voice growled at him. My body began failing again at that moment, the adrenaline from our sex falling out of me in a matter of seconds.

"Shit, Renji, at least let me explain," he growled, standing up to tie his sash back into place.

"There is nothing to fucking explain, dipshit," the man stopped and screamed at Ichigo. "I really didn't want to think this is what was actually going on when you flipped shit over him back in Hueco Mundo, but I guess that was just wishful thinking."

Ichigo paled, suddenly realizing the weight of the entire situation. I watched him with amusement and intrigue as he sank back to the floor, head in his hands, completely destroyed at the entire problem. The gears clicked into working order in his brain, shoving him from neutral to 5th gear in one quick movement. He turned his eyes to mine, sorrow dripping from his features, desperate for me to say something, anything to comfort him.

Of course, I couldn't speak. But my reaction didn't help at all. Smug and cruel were the only emotions I was capable of at that moment, if only for the sake of driving him further away from the destruction that only I could manage. I continued to remind myself that his broken expression was a good thing.

"Disgusting," Renji muttered, turning on my tired form. Spitting on the ground beside me, he reached out and clamped a hand around the top of my head as if I were a doll. With my injuries, I might as well had been nothing but that. He dragged me from the room, pulling me behind him as I struggled against the headache that was building in my skull.

The last thing I saw was Ichigo's terrified eyes before I was flipped out into the hallway rather viciously and the door slammed shut between us.

So much for cuddling, I guess.

* * *

AN : I'm so fucking mean.

Review for me.


	10. Chapter 10

AN : What the hell is up with the extreme over abundance of m-preg GrimmIchi stories? Seriously now? That is why I hate 14 year olds who think they can write. It's like they are trying to justify enjoying two guys fucking by basically turning one of them into a girl. Whatever, give me dick and lots of it in my stories, I can't stand reading trash like that.

* * *

I found my voice rather painfully halfway down the hallway. "Get the fuck off of me!" I croaked, words coming out choppy and in agony.

"Shut the hell up," Renji spat back at me, ignoring the nails I was sinking into his forearm.

He tossed me into an open room like I was a discarded doll, my body falling against the wood floor with a hollow thud. His foot trapped me to the ground, my body unable to function under his weight. I was furious, I couldn't see straight because I wanted to slaughter him so badly. I wanted to rip his head from his shoulders and splatter the walls crimson every time I heard his voice.

"What should we do with him, Captain?" I heard him ask.

Captain Pretentious answered with his bored drawl, "I don't care what you do with him, you've made this your problem."

"You won't help me at all with this?" I was secretly glad Byakuya wasn't helping.

"He's got another four hours to trial, Vice-Captain, if you can't wait another four hours to see him die, be my guest and kill him now." My heart sunk.

I was to be killed by the shinigami. Not just any shinigami though, a shinigami that was not Kurosaki Ichigo. That made me angrier than anything they could have done to me.

* * *

I was sitting in the center of the room, gagged and chained to the floor when the door opened and Ichigo was tossed in violently. His head cracked against the floorboards so hard I was certain blood and brains should have just started pouring out. Our eyes met briefly, but I couldn't see Ichigo in them. I couldn't even see that angry Hollow he kept trapped within. I saw malice, frustration, desperation and hatred glaring back at me before his body was given the same fate as mine.

You could have called it a trial if you wanted to, but it was more like the proceedings to an execution. Three people I assumed were Captains joined Byakuya, Renji and that bitch that shoved her steel through my throat. They just sat, talking to each other about how they should handle the situation. There was a silver haired captain that seemed rather laid back about the entire situation, a guy with a really big grin and a creepy hat and a man who flirted with Soi Fong the whole time.

"I don't think we should kill him, I could use him as a test subject," the creepy one said.

"Kurotsuchi, I don't think even you could handle this man when he's been healed," the silver haired man replied.

"Captain Ukitake, if I may say something we all probably know, it wouldn't be that hard to keep him contained because of his current condition," Byakuya snorted.

"I don't understand why we are having this conversation either way, he's the only remained Espada, yes?" the man in the pink kimono asked no one in particular.

"I don't see your point," Byakuya stated.

"He can't be that dangerous if he's the only one left," he muttered, slightly defeated under the cold captain.

"And then there is the question of just what we should do with Kurosaki," Soi Fong spat at Ichigo. I watched as his expression remained steadfast, even under her heavy glare. "We gave you a bit of a break after your little incident in Hueco Mundo, but this is a little far."

I wanted to say something, but the gag in my mouth was making my words come out in gibberish.

"I knew something had changed, Ichigo, but I could never imagine what exactly you were up to. With an Arrancar, no less!" Renji said with anger.

I was still trying to speak, my voice picking up as the captains continued to make their decisions.

"Death to the both of them," Byakuya finally stated. "We don't need the liability of keeping an Espada or his plaything around."

"At least give them the chance to speak before condemning them, Captain Kuchiki," Ukitake said before walking over and finally pulling the fabric from my bone dry mouth.

I said the only thing that could get Ichigo out of the situation. I didn't stop to consider his feelings and I certainly refused to look at him as I spoke the words that would save his life.

"He had no choice in the matter," I said with a scratchy, low voice.

Ukitake narrowed his eyes, "What do you mean, exactly?"

"I mean, I fucking raped him, dumbass," I spat, the anger seeping into my words. I chanced a look at the boy and saw the sorrow dripping off his features. Determined to continue the story, I plastered a wide grin across my face and continued, "If you even thought he actually wanted me, you'd have to be fucking crazy. Why do you think he's so bloodied up? I nearly had to beat the bastard into submis-"

A foot slammed against the side of my head with a crack and I fell sideways, that tell-tale grin still welded to my face as I stared up at Renji. "Trash," he spat, suddenly believing everything he had seen earlier was nothing more than a clever ruse set up by Ichigo to conceal his secret.

I continued to speak with painful words, convinced that my throat had reopened and blood would start pouring through the bandages at any moment. "I don't give a shit about what you do to me, I really don't, but I would rather you not take it out on the kid."

"Give me one good reason," Byakuya said, his back turned.

"Because I can't help how fucking hard he makes me."

That was the end for me. I was tossed back into that black dungeon with my arms bound and my zanpakutou still missing. It was strange not having it stuck through my sash all the time. I assumed Ichigo had been set free, but at that point in time I wasn't sure. All I knew was that his expression was filled with the same anger and amusement it was the first time I fought him, which is the reason I fell so hard in the first place.

As I sat in that cell for the next however many days it was, my body started deteriorating. I was so starved my ribs had begun to poke out and my cheeks were sunken. Each time the door wretched open and they came in to change the blood soaked bandages and poke me full of holes, I couldn't see for nearly an hour because the light was so blinding. I didn't know what they were injecting me with, but it would seem that I was to rot in that place being used as a lab rat.

I could feel my life slipping out of my fingers on what I assumed was day number five or six. I couldn't keep my eyes open, even though I wasn't able to see anything with them to begin with. I was laying on my side, my arms collapsed against the cold ground, the feeling of my collar bone snapping slowly under my waning weight. I could have rolled over to relieve the shooting pain, but that pain continued to remind me I was alive, that I could still make it through and that I could still kiss his lips again.

I had a dream about being a human again, which was strange. I hadn't had a dream like that in so many years I'd lost count of the days. Last count was over eighteen years, but somehow I had another one so suddenly. I was young again, running through the rolling hills of my family's farm, laughing with my sister as we played tag in the field of waist high corn stalks. I was older than her by almost fifteen years, she was the bastard child of one of my father's many affairs, but my mother adopted her and raised her as her own. On my twenty first birthday, she gave me a tiny rock that had been polished clean by the river and told me that it was a stone that had fallen from the heavens.

I died three days later, a victim to that same river when the rains came and threatened to sweep away her tiny body. I never regretted jumping in that river, I only regret not being able to let her live her life. She never forgot about me, but my anger toward my abusive, adulterous father drove me to begin the fantastic process of becoming a lost soul. I watched as he smacked her from room to room and beat her down when she missed small chores. I wasn't there to protect her anymore, even if I could see everything he was doing.

It's funny how the world turns the way it does. I became angry at his abusive tendencies, and thus became just like him.

I wanted to tell Ichigo about my life. I should have told him when he asked the first time, but I didn't want him to know how human I had once been. My persona is something I perfected over the years, and I didn't want to let anyone know just what had happened. The only people who had ever known were already dead, and I prayed my father had gone to hell and was still burning for what he did to my sister's frail body.

I woke up from that dream with tears running down my face as if my body could spare loosing the small amount of water that was still left in my heavy muscles. I twisted my body with more effort than it should have taken and faced what I assumed was the door.

They came in eventually, shoving needles into my skin and finally removed my bandages permanently.

"What are you giving me?" I asked wearily as the woman shoved another needle into my arm. I probably looked like a drug addict at that point.

"One is to keep you hydrated enough to keep you alive, one is a serum to dye the hollow platelets in your blood and the other is a sample of your blood to take back to Father," she said quickly and to the point. I could never make out her face, but she always worked quietly and efficiently, like a robot.

"What are you doing to me?" I muttered, trying not to pass out from the fatigue.

"We've never encountered a true Arrancar before, and an Espada at that. We are trying to determine what makes you so powerful," she stated.

She was gone before I could continue asking questions. The room fell dark again and the color spots I usually got from peering at the sun ran across my vision for several hours. I was passing in and out of consciousness on a pretty regular basis, always waking up with those tears running down my face, but I could never figure out why.

The door opened again, and I thought I was at least in enough health to know that it wasn't even close to the time that whore and her troops came marching in to shoot my body up.

"You're really early today, bitch," I muttered, rolling away from the door to escape the white light. My eyes were so jacked up that I couldn't even comprehend that there was a shape standing in it. She walked over, more loudly than normal and began cutting at the ropes around my wrists and ankles. "Oh, finally decide you want to get in on the action too?" I asked her, my sarcasm and grin still present in the face of my own destruction. Any normal person probably would have assumed I'd had five times the legal amount of alcohol with how badly my words were slurred together.

"Shut up," a voice said. It wasn't her voice, hell, it wasn't even female.

"What the hell, did they fire the woman?" I uttered.

"Yes, and I'm your new doctor and we need to get you somewhere else that I can take a little better care of you," the deep male voice grunted as I felt my body raising off the cold floor and pressed against something warm that smelled deeply of metal and pain.

"But I kind of liked the floor, I found a comfortable spot with a dip I could put my shoulder into," I laughed as my head knocked against something hard, sending pain shooting through my brain.

"Fuck," the voice muttered as I felt my legs wrap around something, I assumed it was whoever had picked me off the floor. "I'm certain you weight less than I do right now."

"I feel like I weigh a million fucking kilos," I cursed, my arms flopping over someone's... shoulders?

"Yeah, well being a dead weight isn't exactly helping me either," the voice continued. "Shut your eyes, we are leaving the dark."

I just did what the voice said, it seemed to know what was going on. Screwing my eyes shut, I smiled against the person that appeared to be carrying me like I was as light as a feather.

"Can I tell you something before you stick me full of needles, new doctor man?" I asked, my brain finally falling over the small ledge that kept me between controlled sanity and uncontrolled insanity.

"What is that?" he grunted under my weight.

"I did something stupid and now I'm never going to get to see my sister again," I spoke in a singsong voice.

"Why won't you be able to see your sister?"

"Because I was going to let Ichigo kill me and I would have spent the rest of my new life searching for her in Soul Society so I could hug her and tell her that daddy wouldn't beat her ever again," I laughed, those tears falling out of my closed eyes again.

"You'll still be able to see her, Grimmjow," the voice said with a sad voice.

"Nope, because you won't let me die by the hand of a shinigami, you will just let me wither away until I am nothing more than a shriveled soul," I smiled. "And she can't love an empty shell."

"I promise, Grimmjow, you will see her again."

And for some reason, I believed the voice. It somehow was very comforting to me in my rattled state of mind.

* * *

AN : You like my fictitious Grimmjow memories? I'm trying to go after the tragic flaw characteristics of the poor man.

I hate this chapter. It's heartbreaking for me to have to read it four times, looking for mistakes because it's just so... pathetic? Sad? I hate what I do to these two, but it will make them stronger.

Revieeeeew. Because the next chapter will take awhile to come out and if you bother me I'll write it faster.


	11. Chapter 11

* * *

AN : rofl I'm back. Miss me?

* * *

Sunlight was pouring through the thin paper stretched across wood slats, the constant brightness pushing me awake with annoyance. I had a pounding headache and my vision was blurry as I sat up and began to take in the surroundings. The room was almost empty and a lot larger than I originally thought. The futon was stretched out across the wood floor, strangely comfortable despite how thin the mattress was. I wrapped a hand around my forehead, trying to shield the assault of the sun on my eyes. I glanced down at the covers, nearly startled at the orange hair poking out from the top of the blankets haphazardly.

I hoped that the past week had been nothing but a bad dream. I was praying to whatever god would listen that I had gotten real drunk and blacked out for a few hours and that everything wasn't nearly as bad as I remembered it being. But as I stared down as the track marks carved into my forearms like rivers, I knew that I would never be able to remember just how terrible everything had been.

Letting my body collapse back into the off white plush of the bedding, I rolled to the side and stared at Ichigo as he slept so peacefully. I had no idea where I was, how long I'd been there or why I was there, but it didn't bother me because he was there. If he was there, it meant I wasn't dead and that I would have a fighting chance the next time they came to dope me up on drugs and run their experiments.

Ichigo shifted, scooting his body toward my half of the bed, sleep still riding him hard. I sighed in a mixture of relief and anger as he wrapped his arm around my torso and pushed his head into the dip of my collar bone, his weight blending with mine perfectly. I could feel his heart beat against my skin and the all too familiar pang ripped through my body, telling me that we wouldn't be able to last in that happiness forever.

I grabbed his waist and shoved him off my skin, the heat leaving my body only momentarily as I pressed him into the sheets and kissed him awake. I wasn't rough, I couldn't previously fathom the relief I felt just by setting my lips against his with a chaste desire. As he started to wake from his slumber, I kept our skin close as his hands ran up my back and into my hair. I wanted to wake up the same way every morning.

"I have a surprise for you," Ichigo muttered, his voice husky from sleep.

"Does it involve sex?" I asked quietly, my hands suddenly moving of their own accord.

"It does not involve sex," he laughed, shuddering as I pressed my lips against his neck.

"Then what is it?"

"It's a surprise." He thought being coy was cute. Unfortunately for me, it kind of was.

"Can we have sex anyway?" I asked as his nails dug into my ass just enough to leave me rock hard. It was the answer I wanted. It was definitely the answer I could get used to waking up to every day.

* * *

An hour later, with his hair still tousled and my skin still dripping sweat, we padded down the hallway to meet with the owner of the house I was staying at. There was a strange assortment of people waiting on the other side of the sliding doors as Ichigo peeled them open. The air was suddenly silent as I walked through and meandered across the floor to the table.

A woman with tattoos, giant tits and one arm was the first to say something, although it wasn't quite what I'd expected her to say. "You two should really consider gagging yourself next time."

Ichigo blushed deep red as he tried to sputter out a response, but I spoke for him. "What can I say, I'm an exhibitionist. I hate fucking when no one else knows what they are missing."

"That's a lovely sentiment," she muttered quietly, watching Ichigo with interest as he sat down and hid his face in his hands. "Honestly, Kurosaki. If you didn't want us to know you could have at least tried to clean up a little afterward."

"Fuck that," I said with a laugh, "No point in cleaning up if you are just going to do it again. Now, who the hell are you?"

She stared at me momentarily before smiling, "Shiba Kuukaku."

"Shiba, as in Shiba Kaien?" I asked. I knew I had seen those tattoos before.

"That was my brother," she said slowly, the tension in the room jumping ten fold.

"I knew you looked familiar, I can't believe I get to meet yet another member of the Shiba clan, although I can't say I've actually met one before."

"What are you babbling about?" she asked.

"Espada number nine sported the body and mind of Kaien more often that he did any other. He was actually the first Espada to die when the Shinigami came," I laughed, not really understanding fully what I was getting into.

The door slammed open just as Kuukaku opened her mouth to bitch at me. The silver haired captain who had been at my so-called trial walked in and gave me a hard stare before speaking.

"Don't speak of him in such a lax manner," Ukitake said coolly. "I still have the power to revoke a lot of the privileges I've managed to get you."

Ichigo looked up from the table, "How did it go?"

"Alright," he said, sitting down next to Kuukaku, "I've managed to convince everyone with the exception of the Second and Sixth squads, but you know how they are."

"What do you mean?" I asked stupidly.

"You've been out for four days," Ichigo said bluntly. "When I went to get you in the first place, you could hardly speak a coherent sentence and spent the entire night puking up blood until we finally got you well enough you could sleep."

"In that time frame, I talked to the other captains and presented a case that Ichigo and I felt was convincing," Ukitake said.

I just blinked back and forth between the two of them stupidly.

"Basically," Ukitake started, "We've got them convinced that you might actually prove useful to Soul Society. This way they won't kill you, but you can't be running off by yourself at the same time."

"Why?" I was very confused at why this man had helped me.

"You are fucking idiot," Kuukaku yelled at me suddenly, "You are the only damned Espada left for the simple reason that you have a stunningly complex relationship with the Shinigami." I wanted to choke the woman to death for speaking to me like that.

"They don't trust you, Grimm," Ichigo said quietly, "But because we have convinced them that you are attached enough to me that you'd think twice before burning any bridges with the Shinigami, you'll be allowed a lot of leave." I opened my mouth to argue with him. Like fuck-hell I was attached to him, that went doubly so for my apparent inability to murder some Shinigami. "You remember your white lie to save my ass? This is my white lie to save your ass," he spoke as though he was reading my mind.

"There is one condition," Ukitake said finally. "The Twelfth division is still going to run tests."

"Yeah, because I really want those fuckers poking me full of holes again," I was almost pissed enough to slaughter the room.

"Grimm, they aren't going to do what they did to you again." The words fell from Ichigo's lips with a certain sadness I'd not heard before.

"How do you know they aren't going to?" I spat across the table at him.

His chocolate eyes shot up and bore holes into my flesh as he spoke, "Because I've agreed to the same tests."

Until that moment in time, it had never occurred to me that the powers and abilities that Ichigo had managed to obtain could actually be similar to mine. He felt like a hollow when that mask came over his features, but I'd honestly never stopped to consider the fact he could have actually obtained something so similar to me. It was scary to think that he had done those things to his body for the simple need to defeat me.

I didn't say anything, I knew any of my arguments would be met with his usual stubborn behavior.

"I don't like this idea," I said firmly.

"Neither do we, but it's the best we can do," Ukitake commented, standing up to take his leave. "While you are in Seireitei or the Rukongai, nothing will happen to either of you that is condoned by laws of Soul Society. I can't guarantee that rouge Shinigami won't make attempts at your life though."

I laughed at the man, "I'm stronger than most of your Captain-class Shinigami. I'm pretty sure that I'll be alright."

"He's just telling you not to do anything stupid," Ichigo muttered.

"You should know better than anyone, I'm the king of stupid."

"I know you are."

We spent the rest of the day lazing about in the tall grass outside the woman's ridiculous looking house. I had no idea how someone could actually enjoy looking at that thing every day. Whatever floats her boat, I guess.

My body still hurt. My throat had finally healed up, but my muscles were tired and strained from the day's activities. I imagined it was because I hadn't used too many of them for almost a week, but I could have been wrong. I didn't want to image what they had actually done to me in that hell.

We were laying in an open field when the sun sank to the horizon and the stars began peeking out. It was just like the first night we spent together. His innocence was still peaking through as we watched the clouds float through the night sky. We didn't talk for the longest time, just enjoyed the presence of each other as he played with my hair and I listened to his heart beating through his chest like he'd just run a marathon.

"Come with me," he said suddenly. I tumbled out of his lap as he stood up and reached out to help me up. Our calloused hands ran against each other as he drug me to my feet, my body running up against his calmly, sending chills down my spine as his breath tickled my skin.

"Where are we going?"

"I told you that I had a surprise for you," he laughed. He was full of surprises that day as he grabbed my wrist and began to run toward the giant wall that wrapped it's way around Seireitei. I shut up and followed him, the night breeze touching my bare chest as we ran toward some unknown location. Ichigo had a smile on his features as his feet crunched against the sun scorched twigs and for once I felt as though it was a true smile.

Romance was never my forte. I don't get it and I'll never be able to roll with it. I don't do lovey-dovey shit and I'm certainly not capable of love. But with this kid, I think I got closer than I would ever get again. I watched his muscles flex in the pale moonlight and continued my secret worship of that body.

I wanted him to save me from the living nightmare I'd been living since I ate my first soul. But I would never let him save me because he would have succeeded so easily. Then he would have gotten bored and left me all alone and I would have been thrown back to square one again. So I pushed him away. I pushed my cold behavior onto him. I never made love to him, I fucked him. I never enjoyed my time with him, only tolerated.

"Where are we going?" I asked Ichigo as we wandered into what seemed to be a garden. He didn't answer me, just smiled and kept walking. We walked across the stones that littered the small stream that ran through the trees and between the flowers. He pushed open an ivy covered gate before he looked at me.

"Don't move, I'll be right back," he said before vanishing into the dimly lit area. I peaked over him as the gate slammed on me, intrigued to see a figure in the moonlight before my vision was cut off.

I paced in little circles for what felt like hours before the gate opened again. His bright eyes peered out at me, shining with happiness as he stepped to the side and let me pass. I scanned the area quickly, spotting the figure I'd seen earlier sitting on a bench far enough away I couldn't make out who it was.

"Ichigo, what is this?" I asked, almost angry that he'd drug me all this way to meet someone I didn't know.

He grabbed my hand and I furrowed my brow as our fingers twined together. "This is why we worked so hard to get you out, Grimmjow." Ichigo tugged me along, his eyes no longer on me but on the person in the distance.

"What, so you could set me up on a blind date? Or is that a priest and this is your funny way of black mailing me into marrying you," I said with annoyance, knowing deep down that both were wrong.

"Hardly."

I watched with peaked curiosity as the figure came into view. It was a woman. A small woman, with a petite form and long blonde hair. She stood up and turned to face me, our eyes colliding through the dark. Those blue eyes, they struck me so hard I stopped moving. I let my fingers fall from Ichigo's as my feet quit working properly and I just stood still.

Ichigo turned his face toward mine and smiled, "I promised that you would get to see her again. And you know I'm terrible at breaking promises."

She walked around the bench and walked to me with her hands place neatly behind her back. I still couldn't move as she walked up and stared up at me with those beautiful eyes.

"Kyrie," I said stupidly, my arms working of their own accord as the reached out and pulled her to my chest. I could feel her tears running down my scars as her hands surrounded my waist. I didn't know how to handle the emotions that were slamming into me as I tangled my hands into the soft hair of my lost baby sister.

"Grimm, I didn't think I'd ever see you again," she said through broken words.

I couldn't stop myself as I fell to my knees and wrapped my hands around her face. I studied her features the best I could in the dim light, she had grown so big since the last time I'd hugged her tiny body. I tried desperately to keep the tears from pouring down my face as she held onto my arms like I was a mirage that would vanish at any moment. I managed to hold all the saline in except one streak that fell under my mask and ran down my jaw.

"I can't believe I found you," I said, wrapping her into a hug again. "I'll never leave you again. You are never going to be alone ever again."

* * *

AN : Review my lame chapter. Sorry I have been gone so long, I managed to get a new boyfriend and have only slept in my own bed about five times in the last month, which is usually where I do all my writing. xD


	12. Chapter 12

AN : I'm going Gurren Lagann on your ass and doing a time skip that doesn't suck (because I wrote myself into a hole in earlier chapters.) Not to be confused with a Death Note time skip, which does suck huge monkey balls.

* * *

The next few days were some of the most satisfyingly boring days I'd ever had the grace of being involved with. I'd wake up, have sex with Ichigo, eat breakfast and have Kyrie take us for our science experiments, spend the entire afternoon talking to her about everything under then sun, have sex with Ichigo and then sleep.

They were some of the best days I'd had in a very long time. Of course, nothing good can stay forever, at least when you are talking about my luck.

Ichigo was to be sent back to the human world and I was going to be staying in Soul Society. It really didn't sound all that bad, until I found out that he wasn't a normal Shinigami and couldn't jump across worlds at the drop of a hat like every other Shinigami that ever lived.

"Grimmjow, I can't help it that I need to go back," he whined one morning as I tangled my fingers through his orange hair.

"It wouldn't be that bad if I were at least allowed to go with you," I stated simply.

"That would make a lot of sense, I'm sure that you are very capable of living a normal human life," he retorted with biting sarcasm.

"Are you mocking me?" I snapped at him.

"Yes, I am. You are a very proud, angry individual and I'm certain that you would do something to get yourself arrested the second your feet touched human soil."

"We both know they couldn't hold me."

"What would you even do in the real world? I mean really, you'd have to get a job and shit."

I thought about that one for a second before a smile traced my lips mischievously. "I'd totally be a fucking teacher so we could fuck right under everyone's nose and they'd never know."

"Real smart."

"You know it would be hot if I fucked you over that desk and then you saw it the next day with all your classmates around." Even if he didn't think so, I thought it was a nice idea.

"Anyway, even though I'm leaving tomorrow, I can't believe that you'd get bored. Kyrie is here and you are fitting in so well with everyone," he laughed up at me.

I wrapped my arms around him and pulled his body as close as I could, "I love my little sister but it's just going to be boring around here without you to keep me company."

"I bet you will manage."

Strange part was, I did manage. I watched with my usual stoic demeanor as Ichigo walked into the blinding white doors that sent him back home. I spent half of my days in Seireitei and the other half at Kuukaku's house, which she actually moved from time to time. It became almost common place to see a new face staring at me curiously every day. I'd not given up my white uniforms and Pantera was eventually returned to me. I couldn't understand why I still lived the life of an Arrancar in a world of Shinigami, maybe I was stuck in my old ways and maybe I was just too stubborn to move on.

I got used to walking through town with children staring and pointing. They knew the Shinigami, but what was I? I looked like a Shinigami, with my reversed hakama and zanpakutou, but I still had my hollow hole punched through my stomach and a bone on my cheek. Most of the parents of the children would pull their kids back into the houses, scolding them for pointing but still shooting me that look of hate and malice. It was hard to feel complete in this world without someone around to make me feel even the slightest bit normal.

The days ticked by slowly and I sat back and took in all that the world had to offer. I found myself desperately missing Ichigo, the way he grinned back at me when I made fun of him or how he always let out a highly relieved sigh after we fucked.

Days turned into weeks almost stubbornly.

It no longer bothered me as I lived my life alone. Nothing would really cure the ache that sat in the pit of my stomach, no matter how hard I tried. I trained with the 11th squad, teaching them the more brutal aspects of combat with an Espada. Their captain was a man who was possibly the only thing in any dimension that was more cruel than I, but of course his hard exterior was completely emasculated by the tiny pink haired girl that was always seen perched on his shoulder.

The weeks slowly turned into months.

I became more distant, the annoyance of idle chatter and day to day life seemingly boring as my life became easier. They stopped running their tests on me, finally satisfied with the results that were given. I, of course, was never informed of their conclusions but I safely assumed that if I were to ever get out of line they could end my life in the blink of an eye. But I didn't feel the need to act out so violently, that part of me was drying out, as if something that once used to provoke the anger had left me.

The months jumbled together to form years.

I sat with my head in Kyrie's lap as we watched the falling leaves and spoke of our previous lives. I will always remember that conversation, it was almost haunting.

"Grimm, what happened to you?" she asked sweetly, lightly brushing the tips of my sky colored hair.

"I'm not sure I get the question."

"You seemed so alive all those years ago when we were finally reunited," she spoke softly, "but now it is like something was extinguished. Like you know what it's like to loose something close to you."

"I did," I said slowly. "But I don't really want to talk about it."

"Because you are too proud?"

"Something like that."

"You know you can tell me anything," she said. "You know that no matter what it is, I will still adore you."

"Maybe one day, Ky. Maybe one day I will be enough of a man to tell you just what happened all those years ago."

"I really hope you do, Grimm. Because you know that I already know what all of this is about."

"I know."

The years suddenly became decades.

My sister had been a student at the Shinigami Academy when we first reunited and as the years passed, she graduated and eventually became a seated member of the 13th squad. I still remember the day she came to me with some of the greatest news I'd heard in a long time. With her eyes shining and her feathers all puffed up, I could hear the thumps of her bare feet as they pattered down the hallway long before I heard her voice.

"Onii-chan," her voice called down the hall and reverberated off the walls of my room. I stumbled out the door to see her standing between the white washed walls, her chest heaving and tears pouring down her face.

"What is wrong? What happened?" I asked, almost desperate to rub the stains from her cheeks.

"Something wonderful!"

"Wait, you are crying because you are happy?"God, I was confused at that notion.

"Captain Ukitake promoted me to Vice-Captain. I'm a lieutenant!" Her tears were beautiful, I smiled and wrapped her in a hug.

"I'm so happy for you," I said slowly, hoping she didn't notice the sadness that dripped from my words. I really wasn't sure I could stomach loosing another person to the Shinigami. I didn't care that she had made her dream come true in only 23 short years. I didn't want her to leave.

"The first thing I did was for you," Kyrie sniffled.

"What is that?"

"We are going to the human world!" the words left her mouth in slow motion. I wasn't sure how to feel, whether I should be angry at her for taking this long, or if I should have been happy that I was finally going to get back to seeing the only thing in my life that made me feel whole.

"When are we leaving," I stated.

"Whenever you want to leave, I've got clearance to leave whenever you are ready."

"Now, we have to go now before I change my mind."

It had been twenty years. I hadn't been in the human world in twenty years. I hadn't seen Ichigo in twenty years. Unfortunately, what I went back to wasn't quite what I wanted to see.

* * *

AN : You know that when I'm down to nothing but my socks it's business time.

Reviewwwwwwwwwwww my time skip.

I am back at school and my boy is still at home so I should update at least a little more often.


	13. Chapter 13

I am trying to make the chapters a little longer for you guys without feeling like it's just dragging on and on.

Also, this story reads the best in 1/2 page format for wide screen monitors and 3/4 for regular monitors. Just to let you know. I want you to get the best reading experience possible.

* * *

I stood there, in front of the door that kept his reitsu concealed. Kyrie actually had something to do in the human world and wandered off muttering something about Urahara Shoten. Whatever, I didn't really care what she was up to, she was a big girl and I had a huge problem facing me.

I was pacing, half of me hoping the door would just open and he'd be standing there ready to punch me or kiss me or something, anything. But nothing was happening. I knew he was in there, I could feel him running through every part of my body. I finally got angry and pushed the door open and winced slightly as it nailed the wall with a resounding thump.

He was standing there with his arms crossed, staring straight at me with those chocolate eyes that hadn't changed one bit. He still had that shaggy orange hair and he still had that clenched jaw. He'd grown a bit taller and had definitely been working out a lot over the years. I could see the age etched in his face, years of stress and pain pushed into his skin like a vice. A five o' clock shadow traced his thick jaw as he clenched his teeth and blinked at me.

"What are you doing here?" he asked in a deep voice that showed signs of at least a few years of smoking.

"Kyrie was seated and I was given permission to come see you," I stated calmly, watching as his eyes narrowed and he sighed in annoyance, "But you are making it clear I'm not really wanted."

"It's not that, Grimmjow," he said slowly, running his hand through his hair slowly. I watched with a stupid expression as the tips of his orange locks slid out from under the calloused fingers and returned to their original resting place again and again.

"Then what is it?" I was royally confused. But my confusion lifted when I watched the doorway behind him with terror.

"You know I can't sleep unless you tell me a story, Daddy," the tiny voice sputtered with a slight lisp. I watched as Ichigo turned and crouched down next to the little boy and put his hands on either side of the child's face.

"Go brush your teeth and I'll come tell you one in just a few minutes," he said with a sorrowful smile.

"Okay!" the voice was so small and cheery. I furrowed my eye brows and watched as the little orange haired boy waved at me before vanishing down the hallway. I was almost surprised that the child waved at me, but when I remembered just who his father was I understood why the kid could see me.

Ichigo didn't move. He stayed crouched on the floor and put a hand over his face, frozen in his inability to decide how to handle the entire circumstance. He looked angry, but not at the boy. It could have been an anger at himself for running away from his old life, or it could have been for something so human I really could never understand his plight, which actually angered me.

When he spoke, it was cold. That usual spark that I remembered in his words had vanished. "Orihime and his older sister, June, died in a car accident about a year ago."

I didn't know what to say. I hadn't even known he'd gotten married and had kids. No wonder he looked like shit. The anger was pooling in my chest and my temper was waning as I stared at his general disposition. "What's his name?" was all I could ask.

"Jack. He's six years old, just turned six a few days ago actually," he said, finally looking at me with hard eyes..

"He looks like you," I really didn't know how to help. I knew that the way I wanted to help probably wasn't the best thing to do.

"He looks like Orihime," he started to stand up. "I want to see her, but I can't jump dimensions like a regular Shinigami. You already knew that."

"I never blamed you," I said truthfully, leaning my weight against the door frame.

Ichigo ignored my comment and kept talking, "Jack doesn't even know what she and I did when we were kids."

"Why don't you tell him?"

"I don't want him to have to live the same way I did."

"Do you regret becoming a Shinigami?" I asked, staring straight into his brown eyes as he responded.

"Part of me does, there were definitely somethings I wish I hadn't done."

I couldn't stop the words from pouring out of my mouth in a terrible combination of stunned silence and verbal diarrhea, "And by 'something', you mean me."

He smiled then, but it wasn't a smile of sorrow or a smile of regret. "I don't mean you, Grimmjow."

I took a few steps forward and glanced around the room. It was a lot larger than it looked from the outside, and was very obviously a man's apartment. A black leather couch sat on the opposite wall with a flat panel television near the entrance. The walls were bare except for a few pictures of the four of them, with their bright shining faces smiling back at me.

"Why didn't you come back," I stated with a deep draw.

"You know the reason," he said with a rasp in his words.

"No, I don't Ichigo. You need to tell me," I knew the reason, I just wanted to hear it out of his own lips.

His eyes met mine when he gave the answer, "Nothing happened. No one came back to the human world, not even Rukia. They tossed us humans back into our world and left us here because nothing happened."

"Did you fight it?" I asked with anger in my veins.

"Of course I did," he sneered with a glare that sank through my skin like a bad disease. "Did you even consider why I married and had kids in the first place? Because Urahara could no longer get me into Soul Society. He's a super genius but he was up against a team of the smartest people the world has ever seen. We had no chance to get back in."

"So you decided having babies with the woman was the best idea?" I almost yelled at him.

"No. I decided that marrying her was the only way to get away from the memories of someone I couldn't have anymore."

"So you just forgot about me? Like I was a worn out toy?" I spat with venom dripping off my words.

He shied his eyes away from me and stood up slowly. "I would never, ever be able to forget what you can do to me. And I didn't realize how potent you actually are until you were gone from my life and I found it physically and emotionally impossible to get close to anyone other than a woman I'd known my entire life."

I moved toward him with one clear objective. I knew he saw what I was up to because the second I was close enough to drag him onto me with force, he put a hand on my chest and looked at me with those eyes he'd never learned to hide.

"Please, not now," was all he said before he turned and walked into a room off to the side. I walked to the door and stood in silence as he son began to talk.

"Who was that blue haired guy you were talking to?"

"He's just an old friend of mine."

"How come he has blue hair?"

"How come you have orange hair? Now, what story do you want to hear tonight."

"Daddy, I want you to tell me the story about the princess again."

"Again? Jacky I told you that one three days ago!" Ichigo's voice laughed.

"But that one is my favorite!" the boy's lisp was adorable.

"Okay, okay. I'll tell you the one about the princess again."

"You better not leave anything out tonight!"

"Oh fine," Ichigo said quietly. "Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess with long red hair. She was sort of silly though and could never see that all the princes in the land had a crush on her."

"I don't care about this part Daddy, what tell me what happens after the mean sorcerer captures her and hides her away from the prince of her dreams!" Jack laughed in anticipation.

"Well, the mean sorcerer kept her locked in a dungeon where his horrible minions would come and say mean things to hurt her feelings," he said with excitement. The story sounded so familiar to me and I about fell over when he kept talking.

"But one day when his minions were teasing her and pulling on her beautiful hair, one of the sorcerer's most trusted knights came and saved her from the evil minions."

"And then what happened?" the tiny voice squeaked.

"Well, the prince and the knight fought for the princess' affection for three whole days and three whole nights. But even though the knight had switched sides and joined the prince's army, he lost the battle for the princess' love because of all the terrible things he'd done when he was younger."

"Tell me about the terrible things he did."

"Well, the sorcerer made him do all sorts of mean things. He killed other knights and lied to everyone. He was angry and cruel for a very long time. He stayed like that for so many years that even he lost count, but one day, the prince extended his hand to the beast and offered to help him live a good life."

"Whatever happened to the knight?"

"No one knows, because the prince and the princess ran away and had a secret wedding. The knight was so heartbroken that the princess ran away with another man that he vanished. When the prince and princess returned, no one knew where he had gone. Some say that he met a queen and fell in love and some say that he ran away to a far away land and became the most powerful knight the world has ever known."

Ichigo's voice died off just as I heard the sheets on his son's bed rustle. Moments later he walked from the room and shut the door behind him quietly. He glanced up at me and blushed as if he suddenly had something to be embarrassed about.

"He finally fell asleep," he muttered sheepishly.

"That certainly was a strange way to put our relationship," I said quietly.

"Previous relationship, and it wasn't really about us."

"So it was about you and the woman."

"Yeah, it was."

"Then why the hell was I even in it?"

"Because, well, I don't really know," he said, a blush still dusting his cheeks.

I needed to give him something to be embarrassed about. I grabbed the back of his head and yanked backward, secretly pleased at the deep groan that ripped out of his throat. I pushed my lips against his, almost certain that I bruised the skin as my teeth pulled at the thin skin. Years of anger and frustration poured out of me without a word being said. As our tongues dived in and out of each other, I stopped wondering what he had been doing all of these years and why there was huge scar carved into his back.

"No," he muttered into my mouth, his body lying completely as his fingers dug into my back. "I can't do this here."

"Where?" I growled into his ear, my lips moving to suck on his shoulder.

"Anywhere, just not here," he moaned between gasps. I watched in amusement as he pushed a hand down against his growing erection and tried to cross his legs. What did I do? Pulled his hands away and replaced them with my own. The moan that ripped through the dark hallway was thick before he clamped a hand over his mouth and shoved me away in a hurry.

"No, Grimm we can't," he finally said. "Not now, not with Jack in the house."

"When?" I asked stupidly.

"How long are you in town?" he asked.

"You are taking the day off tomorrow, I don't even know what you do but you are not going," was the only thing I said. I jumped away from him to fall back into the depths of my thoughts, leaving him resting in a calm stupor in the black and vacant hallway. Twenty years doesn't seem so long when you are already dead. It also doesn't seem so long when you can still command a grown man to nothing more than a innocent teenager with a simple kiss.

* * *

AN : I am so mean to Ichigo.


	14. Chapter 14

College is kicking my ass now that I've decided I'm smart enough to actually try and get good grades. I mean, what? Unfortunately, the story is beginning to wrap up. I was planning on making this some huge, dramatic 30 chapter mega-fanfic, but I don't have the attention span for it and I am struggling to find time to actually write. My collection of one-shots will continue to be updated on a more regular basis (since I've been ignoring that one for this story) so it's not like I will be phasing off of the GrimmIchi fandom completely. I understand that I'm one of the only good GrimmIchi writers and I will fight to give kids something to look up to in their own writing so one day I may step down, or something like that?

Let's get on with it, shall we?

* * *

I watched silently from my perch on a nearby porch still in shadows despite the rising sun. Ichigo made sure his son had his backpack and lunch securely on his tiny body before patting his head and ruffling the child's bright orange hair. Jack clung to his leg as the said their goodbyes for the rest of the school day. I smiled slightly at the sight, he had fallen into the role of a father quite well.

Just as Jack rounded the corner and vanished from site on his way to the nearby elementary school, those chocolate eyes twisted toward my shadow almost instantly. A toothy grin ripped across my features as I removed my shoulder from the wall and jumped to the street with ease. He spent only a fraction of a second looking at me before turning on his heel and wandering slowly back to his apartment.

I followed him silently like a bad disease. I didn't say a word as he rummaged through the closet in the foyer and slung a brown leather jacket over his shoulder. I watched from the open door as he slipped on his shoes and poked at his hair in the mirror once more before he shrugged past me and out onto the patio.

"Lock the door behind you," he said slowly as he pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocke and drew one to his lips. We walked almost a block before he had convinced himself to actually light the damned thing, I assumed he was trying to quit and I wasn't really helping the matter.

I followed him silently as he hung a left through a set of open iron gates and wandered through a park. He was incredibly sexy, with his black dress pants slung low on his hips and his light green dress shirt unbuttoned slightly. With a cigarette between his fingers, he scratched at the back of his head nonchalantly and moved to drape his jacket over his free arm.

I wanted to ask where we were going, but didn't. I only stared in awe of the man he'd become, as if the teenager I remembered was completely gone. Something vague remained, but it was nothing but a ghost as I watched the smoke pour from his nostrils. He was a new mystery in a foreign body, a grown man viewing the world with a new found respect and hatred.

As the park came to an end and the city ripped its way back into view, he walked down the street slowly, enjoying the last few drags of his cigarette before tossing it below his feet and stepping heavily on the cherry. The soles of his dress shoes were marred with blistered burns from the countless red orbs he's stomped out over the years.

He turned suddenly and walked over to a large, white building, it's name emblazoned on the awning.

"Kurosaki Clinic?" I asked stupidly. "You are a fucking doctor?"

His brown eyes glared at me for only a second before he opened the door and stepped inside.

That is when I heard it.

"IIIIIIIICHIGO!" a man's gruff voice screamed, "YOU ARE THREE MINUTES LATE, SON!"

"Yeah, yeah. Sorry dad, Jack forgot where he put his school shoes this morning," Ichigo muttered, leaving the door open for an extra few seconds so I could slip inside and lean against the wall.

"Not a good excuse, I see lots of overtime in your future!" his father yelled from another room.

"Yeah, because I don't do enough overtime already," Ichigo muttered as he hung his jacket up in the closet and wandered down the hall.

He turned and looked at me suddenly, "Are you coming?" he asked like I should have known to follow him.

"Oh, yeah I guess," I managed to stammer out in surprise.

His office was small, but fit him well. There were pictures of his family on the desk and his diplomas hung on the wall. Paperwork littered the cherry wood and a basket of toys sat in the corner. He opened the doors to the closet and began putting on a dark green tie, buttoning up that perfect collar line. It was almost a sin to cover up that beautiful skin, but I watched without arguing.

"What happened Ichigo?" I asked again, desperate for a different response that what he had already said.

"We already talked about this."

"I know, but it just feels like there is something you aren't telling me," I blurted out, paranoia getting the best of me.

He turned and gave an exasperated sigh. "What do you want me to tell you? That I regret getting married? That I regret leaving you behind? It's not like you came after me, this isn't strictly my fault."

His words hurt, but not as much as I thought they would. He was right in any case, he always was. My hot head seemed to get the best of me, even after years upon years of living without a violence induced ego.

"I missed you, Grimmjow. More than life it's self. But you and I both know that it will never work so long as I am a living human and you are a hollow. Because that is what we are," he stated with sadness in his eyes.

I changed the subject, desperate to move on. "I am going back to Soul Society tomorrow, Kyrie said she would be done with whatever it is that she's doing by then."

He stared at me, confused. "I don't see your point."

"I just thought you would like to know."

A crooked smiled graced his features, "Thank you, Grimmjow."

We stood in awkward silence for a few seconds, eyes locked with shit eating grins on our faces. My feet moved of their own accord as I crossed the plush red carpet and reached out for him. I let my hands run through his hair as his thick arms wrapped around my back with a softness I never thought he would be capable of.

He buried his face in my neck and sighed loudly. "I missed you," he said quietly, almost too soft for me to hear.

I couldn't manage to say anything, I felt as though my heart would just explode from my chest I was suddenly so happy. I'd never thought I could feel whole again. I'd never felt that way, even when he and I spent every waking moment together. I wanted to punch him, I wanted to fuck him, I wanted to bite him, I wanted to cry on him.

I wish he could have seen the angel I saw, the perfection that sat on his pristine features as I pushed his face back and stared into those beautiful brown eyes. He still seemed so shy, even after all the years he'd been through. I just wanted him to hold on and enjoy the ride, I knew that his fear would subside if he could only manage that.

My lips moved of their own accord as the touched his softly, innocently. It was as if I'd never known what it was like to truly be with him because it was so different than I'd remembered. His thick arms tensed under my hands, his abdomen flinched in response as my body collided with his. For the first time, I didn't want to take him then and there. I only wanted to remain in that long forgotten moment as our lips parted and moved in sync with one another.

He still had that innocence that I always admired, it was almost as if he had never aged at all except for his exterior. As if he never had been married and Jack wasn't around. His arms hesitated only slightly as he wrapped them around my waist and smiled under our kiss. I had long neglected the memory of being in his arms, the warmth and power held within him was overpowering.

With every passing second, I wanted more. And for once, I didn't want him for nothing but a toy. I knew what had vanished from my life, and it wasn't my harsh tones or cynicism. It wasn't the death and threat of an unmentionable sin looming around every corner. It was him. He was the key to my existence. I would wait a thousand lifetimes if only I could see him at the end.

This was single handedly the scariest realization of my life. Suddenly, my previous life was wiped away as if I'd never been a hollow struggling for dominance, like the war had never happened and I was never a ranked soldier in the army meant to destroy Ichigo.

I think he knew what was wrong when I flinched away from him, desperate to try to retrieve what little amount of self I had.

"Grimm, what is wrong?" he asked with concern in his voice.

"Don't use that fucking pet name with me," I spat at him.

"What happened?" he asked again, his fingers touching my arm lightly as I turned my back to him and ran my hand through my bright hair.

"I don't understand, Ichigo," I muttered softly, staring through the ceiling at absolutely nothing. "I guess I am mostly angry at the fact that 20 years ago you wandered out of my life and when I reappear you have completely moved on and I am still stuck in the past."

"Is that really what is bothering you?" he asked with a mocking tone. I, of course, didn't answer.

He laughed softly and moved to sit down behind his desk. "Grimm, I never got over you. I never planned to. I knew that when I finally died and did go to Soul Society you would be waiting for me. Orihime knew exactly what she was getting into, she was a lot keener than she looked."

"So you used her?" I asked with a snort.

"Hardly, I love her more than any other person, but it's a completely different kind of attraction. And she knew that when we did go to Soul Society I wouldn't seek her out."

"Why didn't you try harder to move on?" I continued my assault of questions.

"Why didn't you? There are swarms of women that would kill just to spend the night with you, let alone live their entire life with you. I think we have the same reasons for doing what we did," he laughed.

I sat and took in his words for a moment, unable to believe it myself. "You really never moved on?"

"Grimm, I named my son after you."

His words hit me like a ton of proverbial bricks. Of course, after he told me that I put the names together and realized that he had, in fact, named his own son after me. I was actually kind of angry at him for getting married but not moving on, but there wasn't really anything that I could do about it. So I just stared at him with a dazed stare.

"Jack," I just said out loud, testing the way it rolled from my tongue.

"It was the most obviously un-obvious name I could think of," Ichigo laughed.

We sat in his office and talked for a great part of the day. He told me stories about his human life and how college had been the hardest trial of his career. He told me how he'd not phased into his shinigami form for almost seven years and how he was torn between missing that life style and being grateful the worlds were in peace so he didn't have to battle the hollow. He showed me a few pictures of his white wedding, with Orihime dressed in the longest gown I'd ever seen.

He looked sad when he told me stories of his daughter. How she had been his baby girl and wanted to grow up to work in the bakery with her mother. He explained the freak accident that killed both of the women in his life, apparently a semi truck had tipped over on an exit ramp and tumbled over the concrete barrier and straight onto their supposedly safe sport utility vehicle. Orihime had died instantly, jumping across the seats to shield her child from most of the damage but June had attained massive head trauma and was taken from life support three weeks later.

I'd never seen Ichigo so sad before. He sat quietly with a stoic look across his features, his fingers wrapped around his jaw seriously. Of course, the door wretched open at that point in time and a tiny orange haired blur ran around to the back of the desk screaming.

"Daddy! Daddy look at my spelling test, I got an A+ with a smiley face!" Jack squealed in delight as he shook his paper all over the place.

"Calm down Jacky! Let me see," Ichigo said as he waved his hands around in sequence with the flying paper, trying to catch it without it tearing. "Oh wow," he said when he did finally secure the test, "You did really well on this one little man, and look at how much better your writing is getting!"

"I know! The teacher said that the smiley face was because she could actually read my paper this time," he smiled a toothy grin.

I, of course, snickered at how cute the boy was.

"Daddy, can I show your friend my paper?" he asked sweetly while giving Ichigo doe eyes.

"Of course you can. His name is Grimmjow, go introduce yourself," Ichigo said quietly as he handed the paper back to Jack.

"Hi mister Grimmjow sir," Jack started very seriously, "My name is Jack and I really like your hair."

My eyes met Ichigo's momentarily and I saw all the pride dripping from his features. "Well thank you Jack, I really like your hair too."

"I don't," he said quietly, twiddling with his orange locks, "All the boys in my class tease me about it."

"Well don't let them do that because they are just jealous they don't have such bright hair," I laughed with Ichigo.

"Do you want to see my paper? I got an A+ on it!" he said with excitement in his face.

"I would love to see your paper."

I just stared at the scrawl across the page in disbelief. Jack had certainly acquired Ichigo's penmanship skills, and all the words stared out really small and ended really big, which of course wasn't that big of a deal except his test included "cat," "dog," "apple," "this," and "hair."

"This is good Jack, I think we have a spelling bee winner on our hands," I said seriously as I handed the paper back to him.

He glowed for a moment before turning back to Ichigo, "Is Grandpa in his office? I want to show him too!"

"Yes, he is but don't bother him for too long. Come right back, okay?" Ichigo said.

"Okay Daddy!" and then Jack was gone.

Ichigo sighed, "He won't be back for two hours. Dad never gets anything done with him around and I'm a pushover when he sticks out that bottom lip and asks to stay longer."

"He's going to be trouble one day," I said with a smile.

"I know he is. I have a feeling I'm going to have to ground him several times for staying out too late and taking girls to his room," Ichigo muttered, completely defeated.

We could hear Ichigo's father making goofy noises in the other room and Jack continued to squeal.

I looked at Ichigo with what I hoped was a serious look, "I think I am going to get going."

"Why?" he asked suddenly, not missing a beat.

"I don't want to get in the way of all of this," I said quietly, standing to make my exit.

He had rounded the desk and grabbed me before I had a chance to take even one step. His arms wrapped around my torso and his face buried in my shoulder almost instantly and he sighed loudly.

"Please don't go."

"I have to sooner or later."

"Promise me something," he said into my collar.

"What is that?"

"You will come to see me again. Soon."

"I can't promise that Ichi," I said sadly.

"Just promise me so I feel better about it."

I laughed at his warped logic, "Well, Kyrie is a lieutenant now."

I walked away from him again, unsure when I would see him again and in what condition we would meet. I returned to Soul Society with little to no problems. As fate would have it, I had a very unexpected visitor only three days later.

I'd like to personally thank my most loyal reviewers and helpers, Trumpet-Geek in particular. She keeps me motivated and has great words of advice. BonneNuit for being there since chapter 1 and having readable and understandable reviews. Conjure Lass, DominicanKitsune and Lemon Domination for making me giggle with their reviews. Of course, I know I missed a lot of you, but I still have a few chapters left to prefect my thanks you list. ;D


	15. Chapter 15

She walked in with those scared gray eyes I'd come accustomed to seeing every day when she was still trapped inside Hueco Mundo. What startled me the most is her complete lack of age, she was still the 15 year old girl I remembered quivering on the floor with tears running down her cheek bones.

"Grimmjow-kun?" She asked timidly, uncertain of my current temperament.

"What do you want, woman?" I said with a tense tone, almost afraid of what she was going to say.

"Are you available to talk right now?" she started, balling her hands around themselves, "Or not because if you are busy I can come back later."

A soft smile traced my features as she glanced at me nervously, "You are fine, I'm not really up to anything these days. Soul Society is extremely boring for an ex-Espada."

"Oh, well I was taken straight into Shinigami School, so I don't usually get anytime to myself," she giggled hesitantly.

"So what were you up to, but I can't imagine that you just popped in to make pleasantries," I said quietly.

She stuttered slightly before beginning her reason for coming. "W-well, it's strange really," she laughed, scratching the back of her head. "I am not even sure I have a reason for being so nosy about the entire situation."

"Spit it out, because we both know what this is about," I said almost harshly.

"What happened between you and Kurosaki-kun?" she asked in nothing more than a whisper.

I sighed deeply, unsure how to continue. I turned my back on her slowly and crossed my arms, arguing with myself over the implications of telling her the absolute truth. I knew she had every right to know but at the same time I didn't want anyone to know. I wanted it to be our lost secret. Everyone had moved on, everyone who knew was under the impression I was using him. I liked it that way.

But we both knew I wasn't using him.

"What exactly do you want to know?" I asked her coldly.

I could feel her shifting uncomfortably. "You know, what happened that makes him freeze up and get angry whenever he hears your name?"

I laughed slightly, "Is he still bitter that I beat his ass into the ground over and over?"

She didn't laugh. Not even a smile. "That isn't it, Grimmjow-kun."

I sat down, hard. Staring at her, I could see it in that age-less face. Inoue Orihime knew everything. It was almost as if she had seen what had transpired all those years ago and came to grips with the fact she was second choice. Her lip quivered slightly, not out of nervousness or fear but out of anger.

"So, boy got some balls and told you," I snickered at the thought of him breaking down and telling her everything.

"He didn't," she muttered, arms crossed and eyes ablaze. "He talked about you when he slept."

"Really?" I asked stupidly.

"Almost every night. He never stopped. Every once in awhile it was so devastatingly angry that I could convince myself it wasn't what I truly believed, but it always ended the same way. With a smile."

I didn't know what to say, so I stayed quiet. There was nothing to say, I hadn't really done anything to be upset about. But her innocent comment got me wondering about just how much Ichigo and I were to be attached to each other.

"When he comes here," she spoke with a deadly tone that only a scorned woman could produce, "He will not be yours to do with as you please."

I smiled at her then. Not an evil smile or a smile of defeat. A smile that meant absolutely nothing. I think she forgot that I now had the means to jump dimensions whenever I wanted. I didn't say anything of the sort to her though, I didn't want to crush her so badly after she ruffled her feathers up so beautifully to come say those words to me.

"And that is perfectly fine with me," I lied to her face with that smile.

I would be devastated if he did that to me. I mean, I would understand, she gave birth to his children. But I had this feeling in the pit of my stomach that told me I really didn't have anything to be worried about. Nothing at all.

I didn't see Ichigo again until he was 46 years old.

* * *

"Jack! Stop fucking around and get to school before I have to ground you again for the dozenth time this month!" the deep voice boomed out from the end of the hall.

I was almost surprised to hear the gruff voice respond with a very annoyed tone, "I'll get to school when I get to school! Stop being such a damned tight-ass!"

"Don't you dare use that tone with me!" I heard his voice again.

"Oh, like you never yelled at your dad like that?"

"No! I had little sisters I had to set an example for! Now leave right now or I will skin you!"

The door slammed without so much as another word and I took the chance to slip through the window silently. The house hadn't changed much except for the addition of the multitude of pictures of what I only imagined as a very teenage Jack.

I found Ichigo standing in the laundry room with his hands on the edges of the dryer, staring out the window blankly and ignoring the pile of towels spilling out of the open appliance. I thought I had the upper hand and made my move to scare the hell out of him, but he spoke before I could get more than three steps into the room.

"What the hell am I going to do with that boy?" he asked solemnly.

I just laughed and pushed my hands through my hair absentmindedly, "Not sure about that one, I don't have a kid."

He turned and pressed his back to the washing machine, a tired look on his face. He was like a red wine and only got better with age. He was still trim and fit as he wrapped his arms across his broad chest and sighed heavily.

"I know I shouldn't care that my only son is already banging his girl, but I wish he wouldn't do it so loud I can hear," he muttered.

I laughed, "Well, you should be proud of him."

He stared at me, "Why? Why should I be proud of him for making a woman scream?"

"Obviously he's doing something right."

A smile traced Ichigo's face slowly. "Yeah, I guess you are right."

Our eyes met and I grinned stupidly, happy that even after another 10 years we fell into normal conversation so simply.

"Your woman comes to see me sometimes," I told him, leaning my frame up against the door.

"Oh did she? How is she doing?" he asked with genuine curiosity. I knew that even though he'd end up in my bed he would at least be interested in hearing about her. At least, that is what I told myself over and over.

"Oh she is fine. A shinigami in the 4th squad. You know Unohana wouldn't be able to keep her mitts off a healing power that potent," I said stupidly.

"And June?"

"I've not heard much about her. Orihime doesn't actually want me in her life but feels obligated to."

"I wonder why..." he trailed off, wonder in his beautiful brown eyes.

"Hell if I know, probably because she's known me the longest out of anyone else in Soul Society."

He sighed again, "I guess. She never was the brightest crayon in the box."

"Hey, you married her," I teased him.

I am not sure why, but at that exact moment I needed him. As if to prove that he might have married her but he wanted me. That I still played a pivotal part in his future. He watched me cross the room but didn't move a single muscle, just waited there with his arms crossed and his feet splayed. But his response to my lips on his skin was exactly what I wanted. As if 30 years never happened and he remembered exactly what I wanted and how to go about doing it.

I was stronger than he was, a pitiful human locked in a body that wasn't what I knew he could be. I had a feeling he wouldn't mind me smacking him around, he never did. Before even I knew what was going on, I have all but pushed him on top of that washer and was kissing him at a harsh upward angle. I didn't care though, it wasn't uncomfortable.

Our tongues broke apart as I pawed the shirt from his back and clamped my teeth down on his shoulder. He sucked air through his teeth in either pain or pleasure, I didn't care. He obviously didn't either because he responded in raking his hand through my hair, giving me terrible chills all up and down my spine.

Ichigo wasn't in a mood to take his time. I guessed it had been awhile since he'd been with anyone except his hand, which is a horrid fate for any person. My jacket hit the floor some three seconds after my zanpakutou was torn from my sash. I couldn't find the need to care what was going on.

The kid had turned into one of those old guys that you can't really tell is old. He just looked like a guy that used to party hard but was forced to grow up. With his jeans slung low on his hips and the perfect cut vanishing below the waistband, I began to wonder if maybe he aged at half the rate of a normal man. Which would suck because it would take him twice as long to come back to me.

I didn't think of that though, because he had one hand all over my already aching cock and the other digging into the skin of my back as he pushed his angry erection onto the lower half of my chest. This washer had to go and I pulled him down to my level, suddenly fighting the urge to kill him just so I could have this everyday.

His teeth were clamped down on my ear as I let out a deep groan and pulled dangerously at the all-too-perfect jeans casing his beautiful legs. I needed him naked. I needed his skin against mine. I needed his breath in my ear. I needed to be in him. I needed a second chance at life. I needed him.

He never managed to get all the way out of his pants. One leg sort of stuck to his ankle like a very annoying glue, but we didn't seem to mind. He was half bent over with his hands against that damned washer, bracing himself for what I'd been dying to give him for years.

"I better hear you moaning my name," I growled carnally into his ear as I slammed my way through his ever-tight body. He groaned loudly, pain etched across his face as I pulled out slowly. I could feel his body rejecting me, trying to push me away but it only added to the over-all value for me. That was what our relationship boiled down to, an ever present need to be within while denying everything.

Pisses me off.

Ichigo was panting heavily, his thick skin starting to drip sweat onto the cool tile floor. His short nails were digging into my thighs and yanking at the hair, only pushing me to force myself into his warmth further. It was a feeling I had been missing all this time. I had kept myself busy as the years ticked by slowly, but it would never compare to standing over his body and watching my dick slide in and out of him.

"Grimm-" he moaned in a deep, scratchy tone. I dug my fingers into his cut hips further, deeply satisfied that my name came out of his perfect mouth in a tone that I was positive only I had heard.

"Say it again," I said into his ear, refusing to move my body in or out of him until he obeyed.

He groaned deeply as I grabbed his dick, hard. I didn't move a muscle though, I wanted to hear my name dripping out of his perfect lips.

"Grimmjow, please!" he nearly begged.

I gave the boy what he wanted. I slid my hand across the smooth skin of his painfully hard cock. A smile traced my lips as I yanked myself out of his body with a disgusting squishing noise.

"W-what are you doing?" he asked with confusion as I turned him around and pressed his back to the washing machine. All I did was smile at him as I fell to my knees and ran my tongue down the length of his dick. I could see the age etched in his face as his threw his head back and groaned deeply, his throat visibly closing up as I slid him down mine further and further.

"Fuck, I am going to come," he breathed to the ceiling. Just as his hand started clamping down into my hair harder, I pulled him out of my mouth and ran my fingers through the saliva coating his throbbing erection.

"Not you aren't," I smiled up at him, watching the anger boil in his eyes. "Not until I hear you scream."

"Then get back to work, because I think you might have a long way to go before that happens," he grinned down at me as I slid him back down my throat.

I didn't even bother with myself. I was nothing but selfless when it came to pleasing the god invading my personal space. I was painfully hard but ignored my plight in order to free up the hands I needed to please him. I don't know what he was doing to me, but he'd had me wrapped around his finger since day one.

It didn't take nearly as long as he previously hinted at to hear his guttural scream rip through the room. Before he took it upon himself to go ahead and come, I had jumped back to my feet and slammed my way back into his body. I knew I couldn't last any longer the second his voice was in my ear.

"Grimmjow," he spoke, almost angelically into my ear. Chests pressed together and his lips against my ear, I came with a blinding jolt. My world was still spinning for what felt like eternity before I felt my ribcage heaving and the hot trail of his own release dripping off the lip of the hole punched through my stomach and onto one of our thighs. I was still in such a high state of ecstasy that I couldn't tell which limbs belonged to who.

Most unrequited lovers spend their first time back together taking their time and making sweet, slow love before getting down and dirty. I don't understand their logic because if you fuck like there is no tomorrow, you know it will be amazing every single time. I fuck like there is no tomorrow because for Ichigo and I, there may never be a tomorrow. Our lives hang in such a balance that I can never estimate the next time I would even see the boy. Except he wasn't such a boy anymore, he was a man that was currently wrapped around my body like a vice.

His words were so soft that I almost didn't hear them the first time. Lips pressed against my ear, I felt his smile before I heard the confession.

"I love you, Grimm."

I stayed silent. I'd never known love and fuck if I'd known that what he was to me was love. But he kept smiling against my skin as he slowly unwrapped a leg from my waist and dropped an arm around the top of my ass. "I want this everyday for the rest of my life," he murmured, moving his face to press into my shoulder as he came down from his tip-toes.

The hot streaks that ran down my chest were painful. I didn't know what to say to him. I didn't know how to make him feel better. I didn't know how to make the tears stop.

"I can't promise a happy life, Ichigo," I said quietly, running my fingers through his sweat-soaked hair.

"I know you can't," he said slowly, trying not to let the deep heaves rip through his body. "I just want to know that I will see you again."

I could feel his muscles bunching under my skin as Ichigo shifted his weight to bring himself even closer to my skin. "Of course you will see me again. And one of these days, you will be able to see me every second of every day if you so choose."

He looked up at me with somber eyes and a tear stained complexion and spoke the most painful words I'd ever heard in my entire life. They would haunt me for the rest of my existence and I will never be able to dig the desperation out of my mind.

"Grimmjow, please kill me."

* * *

AN : I know, I know. It took me long enough.

But don't bitch, because I gave you some smut as a present for your patience.

Review!


	16. Chapter 16

I laughed at him. I shouldn't have but I just couldn't help myself. He looked so damned cute. I hated myself for never being able to take him seriously, but I think deep down he knew how ridiculous he was being.

"I am not going to kill you."

Anger flashed across his features as he pushed me away slightly. "Why the fuck not?"

"Who would take care of Jack? Your father? I am sure that would be extremely helpful."

He shook his head and began to stomp out of the room, still stark naked. "You don't even understand what I mean, do you?" he mumbled under his breath.

Little fucker thought I was stupid. I chased after him and wrapped my arms around his waist, "Of course I know what you mean."

I could feel him melting as I pressed my lips against the crook of his shoulder. He groaned in both annoyance and arousal as he pulled out of my arms and vanished into a side room. I stood in the door frame and watched as he yanked a dress shirt from it's hanger and began covering up that sinfully gorgeous body.

"Are you so lonely, Ichigo?" I asked him slowly as he pulled pants over his legs and yanked socks from the dresser.

Malice ran through his chocolate eyes, "That is the first time I've fucked since Inoue died. And it sure as hell was the first time I've enjoyed myself since you left me on this planet to rot without so much as a decent farewell."

Ouch. Okay, I guess I deserved that. "That isn't fair and you know it."

"I am not you, Grimmjow!" he started yelling at me, tears long dry. "I can't live on one fuck every fifteen years. And don't you dare tell me to go find someone else because you know that there is no one for me except you!" I waited patiently until he had let it all out, knowing that it had been a long time coming. "You know they don't need you in Soul Society anymore and I am willing to bet that you have always known how badly I wanted you here with me. But no, you didn't come. You kept me wrapped around your finger by swinging in at the most terrible times and ripping away my happiness by reminding me of just what I have been missing all these years!"

Now I was just getting pissed at him. I don't like being yelled at and I didn't like where the conversation was going. It was boiling up like a terrible disease, ready to break and spill over at any second. His words kept slamming me in the face yet he refused to stop.

"I can't do this anymore! I don't understand why you can't just stay the fuck away from me, because you've made it clear as day that I will never mean anything to you!" He sounded like a scorned woman. Pathetic.

I moved toward him suddenly. There we were in his bedroom, with the woman's picture on the table and his dead daughter's ageless grin shining from the bookshelf. With him dressed to the nines and my still naked body tensed and ready to uncoil. He flinched as I stepped closer, muscles bunching and eyes angry.

And I punched him. My fist collided with his cheek bone in a manner that had I not been conscious of our extreme power difference he would have ended up in the hospital. Blood ran over his lips slowly as vessels began rupturing in his nose.

That must have set him off because the next thing I knew my face hurt like a bitch and I was being slammed against the wall. My head hit a hard surface with a sickening crack and I could feel the blood dripping down the back of my neck as I watched his crimson stained fist come at my face over and over.

He couldn't kill me in his current state. I might have been a little worried if he jumped bodies, but as a human there was little he could do to me. I just stood still as his body began to tire and his fist began to slow. I grabbed his wrist finally, face throbbing and bleeding all over his pristine white carpet. He stared at me then, tears grabbing at his eyes once more.

"How long can you stay?" he asked slowly, his face pressing itself into my collar bone.

"Kyrie says about three days. She has business with Kisuke that could take awhile."

"Stay with me."

"I don't have anywhere else I want to go, Ichigo."

* * *

"Dad!" the scream came barreling down the hallway. "Dad where the hell are you?"

Of course, Jack didn't find his father right away. He found a blue haired demon sitting on the couch with a package of frozen peas held to his face. I will never understand why peas make the best ice packs, but they always work wonders. He stared at me for a second, those haunting brown eyes looking at me curiously.

God, he looked just like Ichigo.

"Who are you?" he asked incredulously. "And what the hell happened to your face?"

"Hello to you to," I snickered at Jack's blunt curiosity. I pointed a finger at my own chest haphazardly, "Grimmjow. Don't worry about the face, I'll be right as rain in a few hours."

"I was mostly asking about the bone stuck to it," Jack said stupidly.

"Stop pestering him," Ichigo's deep voice came from the kitchen doorway as he walked over with a wet rag to let me get the crusty blackening chips of blood out of my eyebrows.

Jack blinked slowly, "Shit Dad, you too?"

"Language."

I grinned at the younger man's reaction to our beaten bodies. "Seriously though Dad, did you do that to him?"

"No."

"Dad."

I butted into the conversation suddenly, "He did. But I deserved it."

"If you say so," Jack muttered. "Now are you going to tell me why you have a bone stuck to your face?"

"Terrible super glue accident."

"Nail polish remover will get it right off," Jack said, blind to the world.

"Duly noted, thank you," I said slowly, a smile tracing my jaw.

Jack looked at Ichigo, "I just came home to take a shower, Miruku wants to go out to a movie tonight."

"Girl of the month?" Ichigo asked with an exasperated tone.

"I guess you could call her that. Except we have been sort of dating for a few months now."

"Oh."

"Glad you pay attention Dad. Did you even go to work today?"

"No, I took the day for myself. Your Grandfather said he could cover the patient load, we weren't supposed to be real busy," Ichigo muttered as he turned to go back into the kitchen.

I scooped up the wet rag from the bowl of warm water and went to work on my bloody mess. I was honestly surprised at how much damage Ichigo had done as I pulled it across my wounds with a sting. Just like Ichigo, I guess. Always doing more damage than I expect him to.

Jack had whizzed out of the house a lot quicker than I was expecting him to. I don't know if he caught onto the weird vibe that had been rocketing through the house, if he smelled the deep scent of sex and testosterone that ran rampant through the house or if he really just wanted to hang out with his girlfriend. I didn't really care either way, because I got to spend more time with Ichigo.

"He won't even come home tonight," Ichigo sighed, face finally beginning to look less puffy.

"You let him do that?"

"I realized that I did the exact same thing at his age and I don't want to be a hypocrite. I almost think he may be getting into the spirit world in all sorts of ways because of just how un-surprised he was to see you, but I just can't be sure anymore."

Ichigo sat down on the couch with a deep grunt. I watched him with a speculative glare, wondering just exactly was going through his head.

"He's a good kid, Ichigo."

"I know he is. Got to say he is probably going to end up a lot better than his old man did."

I grinned a toothy smile, "I can't argue with that. His dad ended up being an old, grumpy man with a chip on his shoulder and terribly latent gay tendencies."

"I wouldn't really call them latent. At least around you," he smiled, closing his eyes and leaning back into the couch.

"Good point."

He changed the subject abruptly, "Do you ever wonder if we are fooling anyone?"

"Oh hell no. I can guaran-damn-tee you that Jack knows exactly what is going on. But he is a good kid and will not only never say a word about it but he will never love you any less for it."

Ichigo looked at me stupidly, "You really think so?"

"I know so. Anyone that walked through those doors today would have figured it out within three seconds," I laughed at him. "Honestly, if you wanted to hide it, you should have Fabreezed the carpet or something."

He grunted in annoyance and ran his battered hand through his hair. I smiled at the damage my face gave to his otherwise beautiful body. My teeth had, apparently, taken off a good chunk of skin from the lower halves of his fingers because two of them were bandaged and the other two were raw. His muscles flinched as he put his hands behind his head and sunk further into the depths of the large cushions.

I smiled devilishly and moved suddenly. He cocked one eye open and watched as I threw a leg over his lap and straddled those hips. One hand gripping his side and the other wrapped around the base of his neck, I kissed him. Deep. Possessive. Domineering. He responded the same way Ichigo always responds, with much enthusiasm and a certain note of sadness.

That weekend, I made love to him twice for every one time we fucked. In the shower. On the bedroom floor. The kitchen counter. The hall. The living room. The backyard. The car. I made him breakfast as he slept off the nights peacefully. I indulged his need to take me places and let him drag me all around Kurakara. I wore his clothes when mine finally needed a good wash. I laid in his lap lazily as we watched Sunday morning cartoons and he ate cereal like a little kid.

I didn't want to leave. I wanted to talk Kyrie into accidentally leaving me behind. I was happy, to a certain degree, when I was with Ichigo. It was almost as though I had no cares except how to make him scream my name. It made it easier for him because few people would believe he was involved with a man and they couldn't see me in the first place. He needed that in their strange human society.

But time passed and I went back. He stared at me with a solemn glare of disdain as I walked toward the gate with my hands shoved deep into my pockets. I didn't know what to do. I wanted to see him again, and soon, but at the same time I didn't. I couldn't keep waiting so many years to see him because he would be old and frail by the next time I decided to drop in for a hello.

So I let the years trickle away. I found a plaything for myself who was nothing more than a plaything. He was young, lithe and reminded me of Ichigo. But he wasn't Ichigo. He didn't last too long, but curbed my lust for at least a small amount of time.

Orihime still stopped in from time to time and we would talk about nothing in particular. She looked good in her shinigami robes but every time she showed up all I could think about was if Ichigo would leave me for the order. They actually ended up trying to recruit me but I turned them down each and every time. I didn't want to do anything that would hinder my ability to take him the second he showed up in my world.

I only had to wait forty years. It's not a long time when you are already dead.

I felt him almost suddenly as I laid in a grassy field with my nose in a book. He was close and he seemed to be terrified. I don't think I have ever ran so fast in my life as I did when I ran to him.

What I saw waiting for me among the trees was a surprise. Not a bad surprise or a pleasant surprise, but a huge surprise either way.

He raised a hand slowly and looked at me with relief in his eyes, "Hey!" his voice called softly.

* * *

AN : Oh God, nearing the conclusion of this tale.

Review please!


	17. Chapter 17

AN: I know this took forever to be released. It's been done for like two months, so I am sorry for the delay. Would it fly if I blamed it on the holiday?

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* * *

I don't remember when I was born. I don't remember how long I'd lived. I certainly don't remember the last time I loved, if I ever had at all. The hardest part of being a hollow in a world of plus is that their capability to love is astounding. They love souls they hardly know and they fall so hard for each other that tears are shed in both happiness and despair.

I hated it. I wanted to love. Little did I know, I'd always been capable of love but I'd simply confused it for lust. It took me over seventy human years to come to a simple realization that I had loved and subsequently pushed away that love to wallow in my own melancholy. That is how I knew how to live; through nothing but anger and sarcasm.

Kurosaki Ichigo changed that in me. I never knew how in love I truly was with him until I saw him standing stark naked and terrified in a small field of grass beneath a canopy of trees. His beauty still captivated me the same way it had the first time I ever saw his face. When he was nothing more than a child, he reduced the king of beasts into a confused kitten. Of course, I was still angry at him for that.

"Hey!" he said quietly, years of smoking gone from his voice. Tears ran down his cheeks as he stared down at his arms in caution before he glanced back to me. "Do I look the same?"

I laughed at him, "You certainly look different, but you still look like Ichigo to me."

He was standing in a knoll of trees, completely naked and extremely young. It was almost as if time reversed itself completely and gave him back the body he possessed when he was a teenager. I understood immediately why he was so confused. He probably died a crippled old man and yet was returned to the body that last saw any real spiritual power.

"You came for me," he whispered, a confusing tone dripping off his words.

I walked toward him slowly with intentions that had never seemed so foreign to me. "Of course I did," I spoke softly as I extended my arms and wrapped his quaking frame against mine.

"I have missed you so much, Grimm," he said as hot saline dripped down my naked chest.

"Not nearly as much as I have missed you, Ichigo," I smiled into his hair. And for the first time, I really meant it.

I ran my fingers through his soft hair, enjoying the way it bounced through my grip. I dragged my lips across his forehead slowly, enjoying the simple pleasure of having his hands against my skin and the breeze floating around us. It was bliss in it's purest form.

"I am pretty certain that I am not going to be able to let you leave me. Ever," I laughed down at him and took solace in the grin that traced his features.

"Good. Because I wasn't planning on leaving."

"Even if people find out?" I laughed at him.

"I don't care. They will be nothing but jealous," he said matter-of-factly before standing on his tip-toes to give me a kiss. His lips had never tasted so good as they did when I realized that maybe I could finally catch a bit of happiness for myself. And that was a good feeling.

We spent hours that night lazily running sloppy kisses across each other's chest, calmly falling back into such an old routine. There was nothing strange or foreign about running my hands across his ageless thighs as he twisted and moaned beneath me. It was as if all those lonely years never existed as he grabbed fistfuls of my bright hair each time I brought my lips to his.

I wanted to be greedy and stop time in it's tracks. It was always bittersweet with Kurosaki Ichigo, as if something clawed at the back of my mind, telling me not to get too comfortable with him. I was constantly reminded of my distance from their world each time he ran his fingertips across the hard bone stuck to my jaw. I could never fit into their world, no matter how hard I attempted.

Just before we slept that night I curled against his body, weaving our legs together and wrapping my arms around his ribs possessively.

"I have missed you so much, Ichigo," I whispered into the dark room, wondering if he was still awake or had been reduced to a sex coma. But I could feel the smile form on his lips and his grip tighten only slightly on my hand as he fell into a world of dreams which I could never enter.

----

* * *

It didn't take long at all before I had an angry woman at my doorstep. Tapping her toe with her hands on her hips, she almost hissed at me when I finally convinced myself get out of bed and open the door after the fourth or fifth knock.

"Where is he?" she snapped with a ferocity I never knew she was capable of. So much for being a meek teenage girl, I guess.

"Still in bed, you want some breakfast?" I said with a yawn. It wasn't that it was real early or anything, I figured it was around ten or eleven but I had been up all night and wouldn't have minded a little more sleep.

"I do not want food, Grimmjow." So much for the formalities.

"Well I don't want you barging in there and waking him up, he has been through enough in the last 48 hours," I sighed at her as I went about making a small breakfast. If the woman's glare could kill, I would have been one foot in the grave.

"What the hell is all the noise for?" A raspy voice muttered from the doorway as Ichigo stood with a bed sheet wrapped around his hips.

Inoue looked so pleased all of a sudden, "Thank the heavens you are okay, I am sorry I couldn't come get you right away, I was off training in the real world."

Ichigo blinked stupidly at her. "Why are you apologizing, I am fine."

"Well I make a pretty terrible wife for not coming and getting you on time!" she exclaimed.

Ichigo looked at me with pleading eyes, he hadn't considered her a wife the second she died. I think it hurt him more than it would ever hurt her, but I wasn't sure Ichigo would be able to tell her that he was done with her.

"Yeah, but Grimmjow came and got me so it's alright," he laughed, running a hand through his shaggy hair.

"Either way, it doesn't matter now. Let's get going, I can think of quite a few people that want to see you," Inoue said as she grabbed his hand and began dragging him from the room. I almost felt that I shouldn't have been watching the entire problem unfold.

I saw the panic in his face, he didn't know how to turn her down. "Inoue, actually, I... um, well you see it's a funny story."

She stopped and looked at him with that death-glare again. "What is a funny story."

"I think I am going to stay here for a little while."

Inoue sighed, "Suit yourself. I can have dinner ready later so you can catch up."

"No, Inoue. I mean I am going to live here for awhile."

The complete lack of surprise in her face told me everything I needed to know. She knew everything. She knew that her marriage was nothing more than that of convenience and he wouldn't be coming back. But the surprising part was that she didn't look angry. Relieved, maybe.

I just smiled softly and walked over to him. Draping my arms around his shoulders and letting my hands brush his chest, I sighed and pushed my face into his hair. He grabbed one of my hands and squeezed warmly. I glanced back at the woman who turned her face quickly, embarrassed to be caught staring at us.

"Do you need me to show you out?" I asked her with a smile and sarcasm in my voice.

"No."

"I will come by sometime real soon, Inoue. I have missed June but it's probably going to be best to just stay apart for awhile," Ichigo said with sadness.

"It's fine. I won't tell her you are here," she said slowly.

"I want to get back to bed for awhile," Ichigo told me to break the awkward silence that loomed in our future. Inoue quickly turned on her heal and began to stomp from the house.

I kissed his neck and untangled our bodies. "Fine with me, I certainly wasn't done sleeping yet."

Of course, we didn't quite sleep.

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AN : Review please, it makes me get these out faster. One chapter left!

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	18. Chapter 18

* * *

Ichigo found himself being wrapped back into the world of the Shinigami, which didn't really surprise me in the least. Years passed at a increasingly slower rate as he vanished from my life for a chunk of time to perfect all his skills. It didn't bother me because I knew in the end he wasn't truly going anywhere.

Any free time he had was spent lazing around with me and I felt progressively acquisitive to my need to have him around. But we were happy, for all intensive purposes. At least I was and I tend to believe that it was never a dull moment for him.

The woman was always stopping by when he was around. It was almost like she lo-jacked him and knew what we were going to be up to so she just had to interrupt our fantastic after school activities. Ichigo was always so pleasant to her and it didn't bother me in the least that their hugs lasted a bit too long and their laughter was strangely personal. He did have kids with the woman and I never really was the jealous type.

June stopped by a lot as well. She was a splitting image of Orihime, which was probably a good thing seeing that Ichigo's features would only look good on a man. She was a chatty, very perceptive girl and didn't find it strange at all that her father was in love with another man. She never once argued the fact that Ichigo had Orihime, we all knew that he would always love the woman. Just not the way a man should love the person he planned on spending the rest of forever with.

I got to take home that cake.

I never gave up my Hollow side, even though he tried to talk me into it many times. I was happy being the last Espada. I didn't mind the hole in my stomach, the funny looks that accompanied my jaw bone and my strange reitsu. I mostly didn't want to let him kill me properly because I didn't know how it would work. Would I be the same or would all the years vanish in one fell swoop and I would start back at square one? I didn't want to risk it.

The years finally picked up speed again when he was moved into Vice-Captain position of the 3rd squad and he not only had a pretty sweet new living arrangement but a lot more free time. Outside of paperwork, of course. I moved in with him and there were little to no repercussions of a Hollow living among the Shinigami. We honestly thought it was going to be a problem because I'd always been in the Rukongai.

I remember the year Jack came to Soul Society. It was the same year Ichigo was promoted to Captain. Apparently, and I didn't get this because I didn't belong in that world, Ichigo is some sort of boy-genius which is why he was promoted so quickly. Only the tiny silver-haired captain that worked with Vice-Captain Huge Tits had been moved up faster.

I was proud of Ichigo.

Jack moved into the life of a Shinigami rather quickly. I will never forget the first real conversation he and I had alone.

"So, you live with Dad?" he asked, forever trapped in the body of a 26 year old. Apparently those with high spiritual pressure revert to the time of their highest reitsu when they die. Strange, I know.

"Yeah, I do," I said quietly with my nose in a book.

"How long?"

"Good twenty years now," I stated simply, glancing over the pages to stare at the boy. He looked just like Ichigo.

"Do you love him?" It was such a blunt question, I almost didn't know how to answer.

"I do."

Jack just smiled. "Good. I am glad you two finally got your head's out of your asses."

I laughed deeply, "What the hell does that mean?"

"That first time I remember seeing the two of you together with your face all jacked up and blood all down the hallway," he paused, looking for his words, "I knew something was up."

"But you didn't know what?" I pressed.

"No. And I didn't realize until many years later just how much you meant to Dad. He never, ever spoke of you. But sometimes he would just sit quietly and stare off into the distance with a small smile on his face and I wanted to believe that he was thinking about Mom, but I knew better."

"Are you angry?" I asked, suddenly very serious.

"At you? Hardly. I am a little mad at him sometimes for keeping it such a secret and I am mad at Mom sometimes because I know she has known since before he did. She was always good at stuff like that."

"Yeah, sometimes I wish they hadn't married either."

Jack laughed with a smile, "No. Don't get me wrong, I am glad they did. It made Mom happy, at least for a time. And she is doing so well now with Ishida, I can't blame her for doing what she did. I just wish she wouldn't have because he could have been so much happier. They both could have been much happier."

I didn't want to sound cocky or arrogant, so I kept my comments to myself. I could never manage to tell the boy that his father found happiness the only way he could because so long as he was alive I would never be able to sate his needs. I guess that is what happens when you fall for a dead person.

Jack looked at me with those deep chocolate eyes that threw me back so many years. "I am happy, Grimmjow. I am not angry because Dad is just a little different. And I am certainly grateful that he picked someone as cool as you are to offset how lame he can be at times."

"He honestly doesn't deserve such an understanding kid," I smiled, honestly appreciative that Jack was such a decent child.

"I don't think he deserves you, but we are stuck with what we are given I guess."

I shook my head. "Get out, Jack," I teased him, "I don't think Ichigo is going to appreciate hearing that you just almost made a pass at me."

"Don't flatter yourself. I am extremely happy with vagina," he said as he walked down the hardwood walkway and waved over his shoulder.

When Ichigo finally got home from whatever he was supposed to be doing, I was lazing around in the back garden with my legs draped over the end of a bench and my book on my chest, fast asleep. He startled me awake by kissing me upside-down and moving my legs to sit down. I didn't move much and he just sat underneath them, letting his fingers graze up and down against the hair on my calves slowly.

"Long day?" I asked stupidly. I could see the day etched into his face.

"Very. Hollow were running rampant in the human world but we were training some kids that were ten kinds of cocky," he sighed.

I smiled, "Oh yes, because you were never cocky."

"I couldn't have been THAT bad."

"You were. I really thought you could have killed me with words the first time we fought."

"Shut up," he grumbled at my biting sarcasm.

"Jack stopped by today," I changed the subject.

Ichigo's face lit up, "Really? What did he have to say?"

"He just brought by some food that his wife made, I think there is still a little left over if you want it," I said as I ran a finger up his arm lazily.

"Oh, that was nice of her to make extra."

"He said she felt bad because two men living under one roof couldn't possibly mean we eat decently," I laughed. "Jack also said that he loves you. And he isn't angry at you."

"What a strange kid," Ichigo muttered, a blush creeping across his features.

"He is just glad you are happy, Ichi," I said, pulling his hand to my lips slowly.

Ichigo was silent and just let his eyes fall shut as I kissed each of his fingers. I knew he was tired and I wanted nothing more than to put him to sleep and watch his peaceful body dream about whatever it was that Kurosaki Ichigo dreamed about.

He sighed deeply when I stopped and looked at me with those brown eyes that would never loose their spark. "I love you, Grimm."

I stood up and extended a hand to him. "Come on, Ichi. Let's get to bed."

* * *

AN: That's it. I felt like that was a great place to end everything. I was going to add some smut, but decided that it would throw everything off. So, instead, I updated my one-shot collection Burritos and Tequila with an all new short that is full of sexy glory. Just for you guys. xD

Review!


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